he who has eyes...

“Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” [Hebrews 11:1]

I was watching the recent Patriots game last night (which was just amazing, I might add) — played in a cool 47 degree early September night in Foxborough, Massachusetts — and near the end of the game they panned through and showed some shots of Patriots fans at the game. There was this one little girl (not the same one as in the picture, but you get the idea), all decked out in her fall clothing, with her parents watching the game. For some reason, this just filled me with such a sense of nostalgia. It was sort of strange.

But, thinking about it, it makes sense. For several years now, I’ve longed to have children (my biological clock must be ticking, I don’t know…), and seeing a cute child with her parents doing something that I would love to introduce my own children to generally gets me feeling something. To call it nostalgia might be strange, because I’m feeling it for something that hasn’t yet occurred, I suppose. Perhaps hope is a better word. I hope to one day have children and introduce them to the things that I love. I certainly have faith that this will happen.

But then again, maybe nostalgia isn’t such an off-based word. There is something about the fact that I once took part in going to football games with my parents in the fall, to watch my brother play for the Fighting Farmers of the great Farmington High School, that fills me with a sense of nostalgia. And since I enjoyed those things, and they were memorable to me, I long to share them with my children someday.

In the Bible, we have the story of the Israelites, having been freed from slavery in Egypt, now wandering around in the desert. God speaks the law to Moses, who then shares this with his people. This is how God spoke in those days — through prophets, not directly to the heart of every believer as it is today. So, to know what God was like, the Israelites had to understand His law and what it implied about what the Lord cared for and honored, and this would lead to prosperity. But, there would certainly come a time (and it did come) when the nation of Israel would be comprised of people who didn’t directly experience the exodus from Egypt. At this time, how would the people know God? How would they continue to be followers of Him without having the direct experience of the exodus that was the central to the Israelites redemption story? God tells Moses the following:

Fix these words of mine in your hearts and minds; tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Teach them to your children, talking about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates, so that your days and the days of your children may be many in the land that the Lord swore to give your forefathers, as many as the days that the heavens are above the earth. [Deuteronomy 11:18-21]

What was important to the history of the Israelite nation was that God saved them from Egypt and will deliver them into a promised land. Knowing this God was of the utmost importance to them as a nation, and so remembering what He did and what He instructs and teaching these sorts of things to their children was also of the utmost importance. The wandering Israelites could be said to be nostalgic of their early days, when God saved them from such a mighty empire, and also nostalgic for the days which were to come, when they would have their own land and could raise their children in prosperity and in a way that lets them know God. In many ways, I’ll bet they felt a lot like I feel when I think of the simple act of watching a football game in the crisp, autumn weather with my children. They were hopeful of what was to come, and were faithful that God would bring that about. And He did.

As an aside, it’s important to note that these Israelites failed. A lot. They didn’t remember God’s laws. They didn’t remember from where they had been brought. I mean, seriously, they lost the law for many years (it was rediscovered in the reign of King Josiah [2 Kings 22]). But, God was faithful to them. He promised something to them, to bring a Savior through the line of David to restore God’s people. This was realized in Jesus, who came not to restore Israel to political and military power, as expected, but to restore Israel and all the nations of the earth in relationship to the Lord. Were God not faithful to the line of David by protecting them despite their failures, this would not have come to fruition.

But, there seems to be something to the fact that we as humans have an amazing memory. God has given us the ability to recall information from the past, and even to associate present events with these memories in such a way as to make us feel nostalgic. To me, nostalgia isn’t necessarily a longing for things past, it’s a remembrance of what God has done in your life (whether you associate those things with God or not) as it applies to current situations. We are to remember these things continually, so that we don’t forget the place from where we have been brought and the place to where He is taking us. We are to write these things on our doorframes and our gates.

Nostalgia as remembrance is simply the recollection of those things we experienced in the past and applying them to things that are currently happening or things that are to come. In my specific case with the girl at the Patriots game, it’s an association of things that I hope for in the future with joyful experiences in the past.

It’s an association of what the Lord has done with what the Lord is doing or will do.

Maybe it isn’t quite right to call this nostalgia. It’s more of the longing for things we hope for yet are unseen. And, being sure of those things is what faith is. To have faith in the Lord that He will provide this thing or that gives us an idea of what our future looks like, and this brings hope. The Israelites were (at times) faithful that the Lord would deliver them to the Promised Land — that is, they were certain that God would deliver them though the land, and even God, was unseen.

Nostalgia as remembrance. Nostalgia as faith. Call it what you will. Regardless, we are to remember the Lord always, so that we never fail to see Him today or tomorrow, or down the road when we have children.