Title
Remember to Forget 记得要忘记
Date
10/11/2026
Description
Luke 17:32-33 “Remember Lot’s wife. Whoever seeks to keep his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life will preserve it.”
路加福音 17:32-33 「你們要記得羅得的妻子。凡想要保全自己生命的，必喪掉生命；凡為我失去生命的，必救了生命。」
Genesis 19:17 “Escape for your life. Do not look back.”
創世記 19:17 「你要逃命，不可回頭看。」
Genesis 19:26 “But Lot’s wife, behind him, looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.”
創世記 19:26 「但羅得的妻子在他後邊回頭一看，就變成了一根鹽柱。」
Matthew 6:21 “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
馬太福音 6:21 「因為你的財寶在哪裡，你的心也在哪裡。」
Philippians 3:13-14 “Forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal.”
腓立比書 3:13-14 「忘記背後，努力面前的，向著標竿直跑，要得神在基督耶穌裡從上面召我來得的獎賞。」
Isaiah 43:18-19 “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing!”
以賽亞書 43:18-19 「不要記念從前的事，也不要思想過去的事。看哪，我要做一件新事！」
Lamentations 3:23 “His mercies are new every morning.”
耶利米哀歌 3:23 「他的慈愛每早晨都是新的。」
路加福音 17:32-33 「你們要記得羅得的妻子。凡想要保全自己生命的，必喪掉生命；凡為我失去生命的，必救了生命。」
Genesis 19:17 “Escape for your life. Do not look back.”
創世記 19:17 「你要逃命，不可回頭看。」
Genesis 19:26 “But Lot’s wife, behind him, looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.”
創世記 19:26 「但羅得的妻子在他後邊回頭一看，就變成了一根鹽柱。」
Matthew 6:21 “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
馬太福音 6:21 「因為你的財寶在哪裡，你的心也在哪裡。」
Philippians 3:13-14 “Forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal.”
腓立比書 3:13-14 「忘記背後，努力面前的，向著標竿直跑，要得神在基督耶穌裡從上面召我來得的獎賞。」
Isaiah 43:18-19 “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing!”
以賽亞書 43:18-19 「不要記念從前的事，也不要思想過去的事。看哪，我要做一件新事！」
Lamentations 3:23 “His mercies are new every morning.”
耶利米哀歌 3:23 「他的慈愛每早晨都是新的。」
Creator
Pastor: Mike Koger
Contributor
Hillside United Methodist Church
3737 US 80
Phenix City AL 36870
United States
3737 US 80
Phenix City AL 36870
United States
Transcription
Remember to Forget
Luke 17:32,33
Some of you have done this. You pull down an old photo album, or you scroll back through your phone to pictures from ten or twenty years ago, and an hour disappears. You smile. You laugh. And somewhere along the way, a quiet thought slips in: "Those were the days."
The kids were small. The church was full. The family was all together. We felt younger and stronger, and we didn't know how good we had it.
But think about what a photo album actually is. It's a collection of the moments we chose to keep. Nobody snaps a picture of the argument in the car on the way to the family reunion. Nobody frames the stack of unpaid bills, the sleepless night, or the diagnosis. The album shows us the smiling moments and quietly leaves out the struggle behind them. So when we say "the good old days," we're often remembering an edited version.
Now, hear me clearly: Remembering is not a sin.
Scripture tells us again and again to remember what God has done. The problem comes when remembering turns into longing, when we stop thanking God for the past and start living in it, as if today is just a disappointing leftover.
That is the danger Jesus has in mind in Luke 17. He tells His disciples not to turn back for what they've left behind.
Then, in just three words, He says something that should stop us in our tracks: "Remember Lot's wife" (Luke 17:32).
Of all the people Jesus could have named, He picked her. We don't even know her name.
She is remembered for one thing: she looked back.
This morning I want to ask a question I'll keep coming back to: Why? Why would you keep looking back when your life is happening right here, right now?
Let's go back to the story Jesus points to, in Genesis 19. Sodom is under judgment, a city marked by abomination, violence, cruelty, and a deep disregard for God and for people.
In His mercy, God sends angels to get Lot and his family out.
And notice how reluctant they are. Genesis 19:16 says that "while he lingered, the men seized him and his wife and his two daughters by the hand, the LORD being merciful to him, and they brought him out and set him outside the city."
They had to be pulled out.
Then comes the instruction in verse 17: "Escape for your life. Do not look back."
It's simple and clear, and it's given out of love.
Vs 26: "But Lot's wife, behind him, looked back, and she became a pillar of salt."
Here is what we need to see.
(by God’s Grace) She was already rescued. She had been taken by the hand.
She was out of the city, and the destruction hadn't touched her yet.
Physically, she had left Sodom. But in her heart, she was still there.
Jesus tells us why in Matthew 6:21: "For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."
Her treasure was still in Sodom: her home, her memories, her comfort. Her feet were on the road out, but her heart followed her treasure back.
Think about what Sodom looked like in her rearview mirror. Every photo album she owned was in that city. When she turned around, she probably wasn't thinking about the violence or the sin. She was thinking about the kitchen, the friends, the life she knew. That is how nostalgia works. It remembers the comfort and forgets the chains.
That is how I remember boot camp. Some of you may be able to relate. I remember the friends I made – the funny moments. I forget the pain, the frustration and daily humiliations. Six weeks felt like six years.
So let me ask the question again. “Why? Why look back?”
Why trade the mercy of the hand that pulled you forward for the memory of a place that could not hold you?
God did not rescue you so that you could spend the rest of your life facing the wrong direction.
Even if some of those days were genuinely good, that season has done its work. God has moved you on, and He has not left you. He is in front of you, not behind you.
Jesus doesn't stop at "Remember Lot's wife." He explains why it matters.
Luke 17:33: "Whoever seeks to keep his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life will preserve it."
Look at the irony in that.
The person who grips the old life tightly thinks they are protecting something.
But Jesus says clinging doesn't preserve your life. It loses it.
Lot's wife wanted to keep what she had, and she lost everything, including the future God was walking her into.
So what does clinging cost us?
First, it costs us the people in front of us. Think of someone who spends every family gathering saying, "Remember when? It was so much better then."
The people at the table are alive and hungry for attention, but the one living in the album doesn't see them.
Second, it costs us the purpose in front of us.
God has work for you now: someone to serve, someone to encourage, a risk to take in faith. But you cannot do today's work with yesterday's eyes.
Third, it costs us gratitude. When we say the best days are behind us, we are quietly telling God that what He is giving us now is not enough.
Nostalgia can sound like worship, but it often hides a complaint: "Lord, things were better before."
In Numbers 11:5, the children of Israel complained about the manna and looked back longingly to what they ate when they were in total slavery:
We remember the fish we ate in Egypt that cost nothing, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic.
And fourth, it costs us the future. A quick glance in the rearview mirror is helpful. A long stare ends in a wreck. And we may miss the very thing God says He is doing. Through Isaiah He declares, "I am doing a new thing," but you can't see a new thing while you're staring at an old one. We'll come back to that promise in a moment.
So, in our text today, Jesus isn't being harsh - He is being honest, because He loves us.
He is saying, "Don't spend the life I've given you trying to hold on to a life that's already gone. Let go, and you'll find the real thing."
The Gospel is not about preserving the old. It's about being made new.
Paul puts it this way in Philippians 3:13: "I forget all of the past as I fasten my heart to the future instead”
Paul had a past too, with both achievements and regrets, and he refused to let either one set his direction.
So here is the invitation this morning: Close the album.
I don't mean throw it away. Keep the pictures.
Thank God for every good gift in them.
But don't let the album become your address. Don't live there.
Because today is not yesterday. Yesterday is finished.
Whether it was wonderful or painful, it has done what it was going to do. But today is real, and God is present.
Lamentations 3:23 says “His mercies are new every morning.”
This morning's mercy was not available yesterday. It was made for today.
The God who rescued you did not bring you out just to leave you with a good memory. He brought you out to bring you into something new.
Lot's wife missed that.
Listen to what God Himself says in Isaiah 43:18-19: "Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing!"
Notice who He is talking to. Just before this, He reminds Israel of the Exodus, the greatest rescue they had ever known. And then He says, "Don't dwell on it."
God is not asking us to erase our memories. He is telling us not to treat even His greatest works of the past as the ceiling of what He can do.
The God who parted the sea is not finished.
Now, some of us hold on to the past for very different reasons.
Some of us are holding the golden years, afraid that if we let go, we'll lose the best we ever had.
And some of us are holding the wounds: the failure, the betrayal, the loss.
We replay them again and again, as if guarding the pain could keep us safe.
Hear me.
God is asking both hands to open. To release their grip.
Open the hand that grips the glory, and open the hand that grips the grief.
You are not dishonoring what was good, and you are not excusing what was bad.
You are refusing to let either one be your master.
And you cannot take hold of the new thing while your fists are full of the old.
So ask yourself: Where is your treasure?
Is it in the album, or is it in what God is doing today? Your heart will follow it.
The new thing is not a threat.
It is a gift from a Father who has never once lost track of you.
The hand that pulled you out is the hand that will lead you on.
So here is a simple challenge for this week.
When you catch yourself saying, "Those were the good old days," or when an old hurt starts to replay, do two things.
First, thank God for what He gave you then, or hand Him the pain and open your hand.
Second, ask Him, "Lord, what are You doing today?"
Then do one thing in response. Call the person you've been meaning to call. Serve someone. Take the next small step of obedience.
Lot's wife was rescued, and then she looked back.
Jesus says to us today, "Remember Lot's wife," so that we won't.
Our scripture today says, “Don’t forget the example of Lot’s wife and what happened to her when she turned back. All who are obsessed with being secure in life will lose it all—including their lives. But those who let go of their lives and surrender them to me will discover true life.”
So let go.
Open your hands, open your heart, and say yes to what He is doing next.
Today is NOT yesterday. So why look back?
“For your heart will always pursue what you esteem as your treasure.”
Let's pray.
Father, thank You for every good thing You've given us in the past.
And we bring You the hurts we've carried too.
Forgive us for the times we've held on to what was and missed what You are doing now.
We open our hands.
Take the glory and the grief, and fill them with Your new thing.
Pull us forward by Your hand, as You pulled Lot's family out.
Give us open hearts, and eyes for the people in front of us.
Help us trust that You are with us today and already in our tomorrow.
In Jesus' name, Amen.
Luke 17:32,33
Some of you have done this. You pull down an old photo album, or you scroll back through your phone to pictures from ten or twenty years ago, and an hour disappears. You smile. You laugh. And somewhere along the way, a quiet thought slips in: "Those were the days."
The kids were small. The church was full. The family was all together. We felt younger and stronger, and we didn't know how good we had it.
But think about what a photo album actually is. It's a collection of the moments we chose to keep. Nobody snaps a picture of the argument in the car on the way to the family reunion. Nobody frames the stack of unpaid bills, the sleepless night, or the diagnosis. The album shows us the smiling moments and quietly leaves out the struggle behind them. So when we say "the good old days," we're often remembering an edited version.
Now, hear me clearly: Remembering is not a sin.
Scripture tells us again and again to remember what God has done. The problem comes when remembering turns into longing, when we stop thanking God for the past and start living in it, as if today is just a disappointing leftover.
That is the danger Jesus has in mind in Luke 17. He tells His disciples not to turn back for what they've left behind.
Then, in just three words, He says something that should stop us in our tracks: "Remember Lot's wife" (Luke 17:32).
Of all the people Jesus could have named, He picked her. We don't even know her name.
She is remembered for one thing: she looked back.
This morning I want to ask a question I'll keep coming back to: Why? Why would you keep looking back when your life is happening right here, right now?
Let's go back to the story Jesus points to, in Genesis 19. Sodom is under judgment, a city marked by abomination, violence, cruelty, and a deep disregard for God and for people.
In His mercy, God sends angels to get Lot and his family out.
And notice how reluctant they are. Genesis 19:16 says that "while he lingered, the men seized him and his wife and his two daughters by the hand, the LORD being merciful to him, and they brought him out and set him outside the city."
They had to be pulled out.
Then comes the instruction in verse 17: "Escape for your life. Do not look back."
It's simple and clear, and it's given out of love.
Vs 26: "But Lot's wife, behind him, looked back, and she became a pillar of salt."
Here is what we need to see.
(by God’s Grace) She was already rescued. She had been taken by the hand.
She was out of the city, and the destruction hadn't touched her yet.
Physically, she had left Sodom. But in her heart, she was still there.
Jesus tells us why in Matthew 6:21: "For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."
Her treasure was still in Sodom: her home, her memories, her comfort. Her feet were on the road out, but her heart followed her treasure back.
Think about what Sodom looked like in her rearview mirror. Every photo album she owned was in that city. When she turned around, she probably wasn't thinking about the violence or the sin. She was thinking about the kitchen, the friends, the life she knew. That is how nostalgia works. It remembers the comfort and forgets the chains.
That is how I remember boot camp. Some of you may be able to relate. I remember the friends I made – the funny moments. I forget the pain, the frustration and daily humiliations. Six weeks felt like six years.
So let me ask the question again. “Why? Why look back?”
Why trade the mercy of the hand that pulled you forward for the memory of a place that could not hold you?
God did not rescue you so that you could spend the rest of your life facing the wrong direction.
Even if some of those days were genuinely good, that season has done its work. God has moved you on, and He has not left you. He is in front of you, not behind you.
Jesus doesn't stop at "Remember Lot's wife." He explains why it matters.
Luke 17:33: "Whoever seeks to keep his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life will preserve it."
Look at the irony in that.
The person who grips the old life tightly thinks they are protecting something.
But Jesus says clinging doesn't preserve your life. It loses it.
Lot's wife wanted to keep what she had, and she lost everything, including the future God was walking her into.
So what does clinging cost us?
First, it costs us the people in front of us. Think of someone who spends every family gathering saying, "Remember when? It was so much better then."
The people at the table are alive and hungry for attention, but the one living in the album doesn't see them.
Second, it costs us the purpose in front of us.
God has work for you now: someone to serve, someone to encourage, a risk to take in faith. But you cannot do today's work with yesterday's eyes.
Third, it costs us gratitude. When we say the best days are behind us, we are quietly telling God that what He is giving us now is not enough.
Nostalgia can sound like worship, but it often hides a complaint: "Lord, things were better before."
In Numbers 11:5, the children of Israel complained about the manna and looked back longingly to what they ate when they were in total slavery:
We remember the fish we ate in Egypt that cost nothing, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic.
And fourth, it costs us the future. A quick glance in the rearview mirror is helpful. A long stare ends in a wreck. And we may miss the very thing God says He is doing. Through Isaiah He declares, "I am doing a new thing," but you can't see a new thing while you're staring at an old one. We'll come back to that promise in a moment.
So, in our text today, Jesus isn't being harsh - He is being honest, because He loves us.
He is saying, "Don't spend the life I've given you trying to hold on to a life that's already gone. Let go, and you'll find the real thing."
The Gospel is not about preserving the old. It's about being made new.
Paul puts it this way in Philippians 3:13: "I forget all of the past as I fasten my heart to the future instead”
Paul had a past too, with both achievements and regrets, and he refused to let either one set his direction.
So here is the invitation this morning: Close the album.
I don't mean throw it away. Keep the pictures.
Thank God for every good gift in them.
But don't let the album become your address. Don't live there.
Because today is not yesterday. Yesterday is finished.
Whether it was wonderful or painful, it has done what it was going to do. But today is real, and God is present.
Lamentations 3:23 says “His mercies are new every morning.”
This morning's mercy was not available yesterday. It was made for today.
The God who rescued you did not bring you out just to leave you with a good memory. He brought you out to bring you into something new.
Lot's wife missed that.
Listen to what God Himself says in Isaiah 43:18-19: "Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing!"
Notice who He is talking to. Just before this, He reminds Israel of the Exodus, the greatest rescue they had ever known. And then He says, "Don't dwell on it."
God is not asking us to erase our memories. He is telling us not to treat even His greatest works of the past as the ceiling of what He can do.
The God who parted the sea is not finished.
Now, some of us hold on to the past for very different reasons.
Some of us are holding the golden years, afraid that if we let go, we'll lose the best we ever had.
And some of us are holding the wounds: the failure, the betrayal, the loss.
We replay them again and again, as if guarding the pain could keep us safe.
Hear me.
God is asking both hands to open. To release their grip.
Open the hand that grips the glory, and open the hand that grips the grief.
You are not dishonoring what was good, and you are not excusing what was bad.
You are refusing to let either one be your master.
And you cannot take hold of the new thing while your fists are full of the old.
So ask yourself: Where is your treasure?
Is it in the album, or is it in what God is doing today? Your heart will follow it.
The new thing is not a threat.
It is a gift from a Father who has never once lost track of you.
The hand that pulled you out is the hand that will lead you on.
So here is a simple challenge for this week.
When you catch yourself saying, "Those were the good old days," or when an old hurt starts to replay, do two things.
First, thank God for what He gave you then, or hand Him the pain and open your hand.
Second, ask Him, "Lord, what are You doing today?"
Then do one thing in response. Call the person you've been meaning to call. Serve someone. Take the next small step of obedience.
Lot's wife was rescued, and then she looked back.
Jesus says to us today, "Remember Lot's wife," so that we won't.
Our scripture today says, “Don’t forget the example of Lot’s wife and what happened to her when she turned back. All who are obsessed with being secure in life will lose it all—including their lives. But those who let go of their lives and surrender them to me will discover true life.”
So let go.
Open your hands, open your heart, and say yes to what He is doing next.
Today is NOT yesterday. So why look back?
“For your heart will always pursue what you esteem as your treasure.”
Let's pray.
Father, thank You for every good thing You've given us in the past.
And we bring You the hurts we've carried too.
Forgive us for the times we've held on to what was and missed what You are doing now.
We open our hands.
Take the glory and the grief, and fill them with Your new thing.
Pull us forward by Your hand, as You pulled Lot's family out.
Give us open hearts, and eyes for the people in front of us.
Help us trust that You are with us today and already in our tomorrow.
In Jesus' name, Amen.