Dancing in the Desert: It's Good to Be Forgotten

Have you ever been forgotten?  I was once, and I'm hoping my big sister won't kill me for tattling on her.  When I was a wee little awkward middle school student, she was turning sixteen and had gotten her first car.  It was her job to take me to and from school, and one afternoon, she piled in her baby blue '91 Camry with a host of her "much cooler" (as if) high school friends and took off out of the parking lot, leaving me standing alone on the drop-off ramp, shouting, "Um, hello?!?!"  It was maybe three minutes before she realized what she'd done and turned around to come get me.  I was livid in the moment but now love to look back on it and tease her about it.

We all forget things, and sometimes we forget people (though maybe not in a parking lot.  I love you, Steph!❤).  It happens because we're human, and frankly, our brains just don't always have the ability to remember all of the things we should.

But what about when we feel like God's forgotten about us?  Those times when He puts us in the car, transports us to the desert, drops us off, and then seems to drive away without a word?  I'm sure Moses had to have felt that way at some point during his four decades of sheep-tending.  He had been positioned for power in Egypt, and there he sat, in charge of nothing but smelly livestock.  We know he had a wife named Zipporah and children, but I imagine that much of his time, the company he kept was but the sand, the burning wind, and the hot sun.  At one point, everyone in the kingdom had known his name, but now, what did the sheep care who he was?  As long as he showed up to give them the food and water they needed, he didn't need to maintain popularity or notoriety.  From the top of the food chain to the bottom of the totem pole, he had fallen.  And though he'd made a huge, hotheaded mistake back in Egypt--hadn't God had his eye on Moses?  Wasn't he supposed to do great things?

Wasn't he worth remembering?

Of course he was worth remembering, and he would eventually be remembered by his people--by the whole world, even centuries later!

But not now.  Not here.  Not in the desert.

That's one of the most glorious and humbling and necessary parts of our times in the desert--to forget and to be forgotten.

Let's break those down.

First, often, His purpose of using the desert is to remove us from the complacencies and the trivialities of our regular routines that have preoccupied us.  He wants us to be isolated from normalcy so that we can forget what doesn't matter, and so that we might remember what is.

When we get caught up in our narrow worlds of self-absorption or our iron-clad itineraries for how we demand our lives must go--we tend to make mistakes.  Sometimes those mistakes are minor, and God is able to whisk us away to the desert before we screw things up too majorly.  And then sometimes, our boo-boos are much greater, and the desert becomes Station One of a character-overhaul boot camp.  But it's often because we've forgotten to bend our knee, forgotten we're not in control, forgotten that He is Lord, that He removes us and says, "Forget all that other stuff.  Remember what's true.  Remember Who I Am."

Forget that money should be the most important thing.  Forget that your world should revolve entirely around your spouse or your children or yourself.  Forget that your job is supposed to signify everything about who you are.  Forget that your way is the best way.

It's good to forget what you never needed to remember in the first place.

Secondly, He uses the desert to make us be a little "forgotten" for a time.  What a load of baloney, we say!  Our whole purpose in life is to be remembered, right?  To make names for ourselves!  To be written in the history books!  To go viral on the internet!  To be celebrities!  To be sensations!

No, the sand of the desert is perfect for putting our feet back where they belong.  How grounding to be reminded of our fleeting influences.  How humbling to be forgotten by the world.

And how good the Father is in the desert that when the world forgets--

He is the One who never forgets us.  Ever.

For as silent as the desert is and as alone as it feels, He never leaves our sides.  And He begs of us: Remember Me.  I am the One Who remembers you.

It's good to be forgotten by the world, friends.  It's the perfect time to get one-on-one with the Creator of your being, the Sovereign Ruler of your circumstances, the Great Designer of the arid desert.

So enjoy the time alone with Him.  Allow yourself to forget, to be forgotten, and to dig in deep with the One Who has brought you here.