He floated through the storm as the rain beat down on them and the waves crashed into the sides of the vessel. There was no piloting the monstrous tomb in which he found himself, no correcting the course or challenging the next squall. No, he was just set adrift, day after day after day, helpless and abandoned to forces outside of his control. When the rain did let up, there was no land in sight, no hope on the horizon, just water all around. That water was littered with the remains of drowned creatures sometimes surfacing, sometimes sinking again, being pecked at by scavenging birds and creatures from the deep. Noah had heard the voice of God. He had trusted in the commands of the Almighty, but where was his hope now? The confidence with which he built the ark and entered with his family and the animals was ebbing away. And then we read a line of incredible news. In Genesis 8, we hear, “But God remembered Noah and all the beasts and all the livestock that were with him in the ark.” God remembered, and the remembering of God is the pathway to His deliverance.
Likewise, the ancient people of the Lord who were blessed and chosen by Him, set aside as His own possession, found themselves possessed by another, by those who would beat and kill them. Enslaved under Egyptian rule, they lived in terror and oppression. They worked under brutal conditions and, with their blood, laid the stones of Pharaoh’s grand civilization. Where was their God now? Where was the one who had led them and protected them in the past? Where was the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob? They seemed so far from hope, so removed from the dignity of their calling. And then in Exodus 2, we read, “God heard their groaning, and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. God saw the people of Israel—and God knew.” God remembered, and the remembering of God is the pathway to His deliverance.
To be remembered is more than just recalling something forgotten. To be remembered is to be the object of committed action. We could say that to be remembered is to be loved, and love is found in the action of the one who loves you. There is a strange power found in being remembered. Being remembered by another connects you to them, and being remembered by your God connects you to hope and the promise of eternal life.
In Luke 23, we see our Lord on the road of sorrow and pain to the place of the Skull. The image before Him is not only the destruction that is sure to come to the city of Jerusalem. It is more than the destruction of Israel bound in the shackles of slavery. It is more than the destruction of the sinful man through the waters of a great flood. It is the destruction that attacks us all through the temptation to sin and the judgment of the grave, the destruction we cannot avoid, no matter how hard we try. It is the destruction He seeks to bring deliverance from by offering Himself in our place. Jesus remembers our fate. He remembers what will come if we are left to ourselves. And in remembering, his love overflows. For even as they crucify Him, He prays, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”
Jesus takes the destruction onto Himself. And we watch as the depth of man’s depravity is poured out on Him. Crucified between two criminals, the soldiers cast lots to divide His garments. Then the onlookers begin to mock Him as He bleeds and suffers on the cross. “He saved others; let Him save Himself, if He is the Christ of God, His Chosen One!” In fact, one of the criminals hanging there next to Him begins to join in. He shouts, “Are you not the Christ? Save Yourself and us!” But what he does not know, what he cannot see, is that this is his salvation. This is what it means to be the Christ. This is precisely what it looks like when God remembers and delivers sinners from eternal destruction. He sends His son to pay the price, to be the sacrifice for you.
But then there is the other criminal, this other man dying beside our Lord. And he, of all people, seems to get it. “Do you not fear God,” he says, “since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we are receiving the due reward of our deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong.” Their destruction is real, their destruction is just, and their actions earned their condemnation. But not so with our Lord. This is innocent blood on the cross next to him. And what does he ask? What is his request? “Jesus, remember me when You come into Your Kingdom.” He longs to be remembered by the King, remembered by the Chosen One, remembered like Noah in the midst of the sea, or the Israelites in slavery.
Is this not your cry as well? In the midst of your confusion, in times of great sorrow and fear, in the face of depression and loneliness, do you not long to be remembered? To be remembered by your God is to be the object of His love and sacrifice. To be remembered means you are not alone. To be remembered is to receive the courage and strength to press on. And this is the promise of your God. The God who has called you by name and washed you in the waters of holy baptism, has declared you are His own and not a hair on your head will perish. He remembers His children, those clothed in the righteous garments of Jesus Christ. He remembers you.
God remembered Noah and his family and brought them to dry land. He remembered the covenant He made with His people Israel and stretched out His mighty arm to deliver them from the house of slavery in Egypt. And here, our Lord promises to remember this condemned criminal, saying, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.” He did no great work to earn such a thing, no profound and detailed confession of the faith was uttered from that cross. No, he simply banked it all on the word and promise of Christ. All he asked was to be remembered.
And remembered he was… and so are you. You are remembered in the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. You are remembered in the washing of Holy Baptism, remembered in the proclamation of hope that rings in your ears, remembered in the gracious feeding of body and blood, for the forgiveness of all your sins. You are loved. You are being remembered even now, so Paradise itself awaits you.
