Can God Forget?

In light of Memorial Day, my last blog post referenced several biblical comments on remembering—how important it is, how honoring, even humbling. But during the research for that post, I also noticed God’s forgetfulness.

God forgetful?

Yes, He is forgetful. By choice.

The Old Testament prophet Jeremiah says the Lord “will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more” (31:34b).

Another prophet speaks of God’s forgiveness when he says, “You will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea” (Micah 7:19).

And in Psalm 103:12 we read that God has removed our sins from us as far as the east is from the west.

I’m sure glad He didn’t choose a northerly or southerly direction.

Look at a globe. Choose a starting point with your finger and move it around the globe heading east. Or west. Either will do.

If you’re moving east, do you ever run into west? If you’re moving west, do you ever run into east?

Now try the same thing starting at the top or north point of the globe and move your finger down. Eventually, you will hit “south.” If you keep going, your direction will change and you’ll run into “north.”

South and north meet. They turn back on each other again and again even though you keep moving straight ahead. But east and west never meet.  

Thanks to Jesus, when God chooses to forget our sins, it’s a done deal.