Spiritual Amnesia

I didn’t exercise this morning. I meant to, but I forgot.

I didn’t eat right today, either. My morning had a late start (not due to exercising), so I grabbed a drive through burger on the way to the office at about 10:45. I wanted breakfast, but I missed the cutoff.

The thing that drives me crazy is that I decided years ago that I was going to exercise and eat right. I commit to it, and then forget. It’s not like I mean to forget. Typically I don’t even think about it, hence the forgetting. The next thing you know, it’s been two days… then seven… then two weeks… then months since I last fulfilled my commitment to do things that are good for me.

There are other things in life that I forget, too. Sometimes I forget to spend time in prayer. Sometimes I forget that there’s a difference between talking about the Word and actually being in the Word. Sometimes I act like I’ve forgotten who God is and what He is like, and truth be told I probably have. Life is filled with things that seek to take our eyes off of God and who He is. There’s big things that distract us, but then there are all the little things as well.

You could say that we sometimes experience periods of spiritual amnesia. We know the source of our spirituality, but we forget to spend time with the source. It’s not on purpose, it just happens. Little road bumps come up that stretch our schedules and so we sacrifice our connection with God to finish our to do list. Maybe one day here… then two or three… then weeks… and then the next thing you know we’re running on spiritual fumes and wondering why we’re so stressed out, so exhausted, so grumpy, or so ineffective. Our amnesia gets to the point that we forget what the connection looks like and can’t tell that we miss it.

The paradoxical thing about this relationship with God is that He never forgets. He knows us. He knows what we’re like and what we’re thinking, or not thinking as the case may be. He is all-knowing, and yet his knowledge of us doesn’t change the way He feels about us. It’s a little creepy, and if we think about the really dark places in our lives it’s down right scary to know what God knows about us.

I think a lot about David’s words in Psalm 139 when I think about this. In particular, the idea that God has searched me and he knows me (verse 1), that the level to which God knows me is unfathomable (verses 6 and 7), and that even the darkness can’t hide me (verses 11 and 12). That includes dark places that I choose to enter as well, which is where the frightening part comes in.

Truth be told, though, my heart longs to know God and I am ashamed when I discover that I’ve forgotten him. I want to have a deep, intimate relationship with him, but frequently find myself distracted with other things. I don’t know why I forget, why I have to deal with this part of my humanity, but I want it to stop.

The last two verses of Psalm 139 have become my prayer in this. Perhaps God can work this out of me, because I know I can’t fix it alone.

Search me, O God, and know my heart;
test me and know my anxious thoughts.
See if there is any offensive way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting.