How Quickly We Forget 1/19/2025

By: Jennifer Richardson Holt

We are a terribly forgetful people. Let me explain what I mean.  We tend to forget past experiences when new situations arise.  Difficulties which we all have seem to always catch us off guard.  I am talking to myself very much here. I hope it is not secret that I am a Christ follower but today my blog will lean heavily in thoughts on that profession and how often so many who choose this same path seem to have the most difficult time with the fact that there are stones and holes along the way. And even if you don’t believe as I do, I really think you can still read on and glean a bit, if nothing else you can learn why Christians are the way they are sometimes. I will let you choose what adjective best fits the way we are.

A very famous song in a very famous Disney movie has a line in it that I have always loved.  The line says, “It’s funny how some distance makes everything seem small.”  Isn’t that the truth!  We have all faced struggles in the past and we have come through. In my case, I have arrived on the other side of them with a great deal of prayer and indisputably too much worry which is a plague I am desperately trying to manage though old habits, as you well know, die hard. But something I find so frustrating though, and that relates to the song I mentioned, is how quickly we forget those prayers that were answered.  Actually, maybe we don’t forget, but for some reason when some new trouble arises, we so often let it just overwhelm us as if we hadn’t been in this same boat before.  And when we were in that boat, He either calmed the storm or held us through it. Yet, all it takes is just a bit of distance and now those answers and rescues are not nearly as visible as they used to be. We know what those dots on the horizon are but can’t for the life of us to apply it today.

Sometimes we have a full blown, unmistakable miracle.  Those are easier to hold on to.  When an impassable mountain has been supernaturally moved, well…that sticks with you. But then there are the countless little prayers that have been answered, or sometimes even thankfully unanswered when they are not even remotely what is best for us.  We cling tightly to the big ones, until suddenly, some new seemingly greater range of mountains looms in front of us.  Maybe it’s just me, I don’t truly think it is but maybe I am an extra special case, but when the hard seasons come, I let anxiety and fear wrap itself around me like a fuzzy blanket. Why do I do that? It would be different if I had never seen prayers answered. Then distress would be warranted and logical. While any unpleasant situation will merit a negative emotional response, why do I allow those emotions to take control when I have a justified Hope?  I know I am asking a lot of questions here.  But I, and maybe others, need to really legitimately consider them.  If I ask anyone to supply a need and they constantly, without fail meet and exceed my expectations, there is no reason that I should panic when said need arises. Interesting that when I word it like that it seems so simple.

Not only do I seem to struggle with the dread and uncertainty of difficult situations, but my mother very often talks about another mentality flaw that so many people have, which seems really natural until you think about what you’re actually thinking. So many people, when something is wrong, usually on a large scale, tend to linger with thoughts of “why me?”.  And I get that initial response. I suppose for the most part, unless you have been living a very horrifically behaved life, in which case it would seem bad circumstances are a rational consequence, to question why something bad is happening to you is not utterly terrible. But the thing is, when you ask why it is happening to you, you’re really, when you get right down to it, implying that this hardship would be better placed on someone else. When my mom presented it to me that way, it stung like a hornet with a taser. How dare we think that we are not deserving of trials and that others are?  I feel guilty just knowing that I have probably thought this. Not a single soul on this planet, past present or future will travel life’s road without both pitstops and pitfalls.  How sniveling must it seem when we think that we are not only entitled to avoid strife and it be placed elsewhere?

I suppose all I have done here is lectured but I do hope you realize as you read that I was talking very much to myself and if any of this applies to you, you are more than welcome to apply where applicable.  I need to not allow circumstances to dictate my mindset. If I claim I have a perfectly wise, completely good and altogether powerful God then why on Earth should allow distress to overtake me? I can and will react when tribulations come because He told me that they would, and He gave me the emotions to do so. But it makes not the slightest sense for me to wallow in angst and doubt when I have seen time and time again that He will carry me through any fire.  And they will happen. Sometimes they will burn. But if He is to us Who we claim to believe, His Goodness, Wisdom and Power are all we really need rely upon that whatever we face will eventually be turned for good. It is time I exercise my memory knowing Who He is and what He does.  And I should probably throw in more gratitude for it while I’m at it.