Remember

 

“Important! 4:00.”

That was the note I had put on my calendar awhile back.  

And nothing else😬.

Not a name or a place.  With chagrin I emailed the whole staff apologetically, hoping someone would tell me what I was missing.

Nope.  But I did get multiple messages of solidarity and understanding from those who have made similar mistakes.

I texted my family.  Wasn’t them.  

Two days later I got a wrap up email from a county-wide organization I am a part of, recapping our zoom meeting, and listing me as not in attendance.😒

I hadn’t remembered and my attempts to help me remember simply weren’t enough.

A string around a finger.

A reminder on a phone.  

Calendar checks.

Remembering is a critical part of our human lives. 

And the word remember or its variant is used 550 times in the scriptures. 

Perhaps I am not alone in my need to work on better remembering. 

King Benjamin taught his sons Mosiah, Helorum and Helaman and used the word remember multiple times.  

I imagine his strong voice filled with pleading as he implores REMEMBER!  He understood what was at stake if they didn’t.  Do we?

In Mosiah 1:3-4 we read, “My sons, I would that ye should remember that were it not for these plates, which contain these records and these commandments, we must have suffered in ignorance, even at this present time, not knowing the mysteries of God.

For it were not possible that our father, Lehi, could have remembered all these things, to have taught them to his children, except it were for the help of these plates;”

We cannot remember all that we must learn for ourselves and teach our children without the aid of the scriptures.

So how do we do that in our busy lives? 

Here are things I have seen others do to make it happen.

Maybe it’s building in scripture time while driving to tournaments. 

Maybe it’s reading to toddlers while they splash in the bathtub.

Maybe it’s listening to scriptures while showering.  

Maybe it’s opening a phone and scrolling through scripture while waiting in line.

Maybe it’s getting up a bit earlier to find the study time.  

Maybe it’s keeping your scriptures on your pillow so you will at least pick them up before you lay down at night.

Maybe it’s a white board on the fridge with an ever changing scripture that stood out to you.

The how is individual, but the remembering and reading must be universal for the promise to be insured.  

What promise?

The one recorded in verse 7 with another remember.

And now, my sons, I would that ye should remember to search them diligently, that ye may profit thereby; and I would that ye should keep the commandments of God, that ye may prosper in the land according to the promises which the Lord made unto our fathers.

Remember.