the remembrance of sins past

I know one of the promises of the bible is that God will remove them from you, that he will remember your sins no more.

But today I read some things that reminded me of my sins - past and present - and peeled me out of that smug self satisfied middle class life. It reminded me of where (and what) exactly I'd come from, what it had cost God to bring me here and how very very little I deserve what I have now.

Days like this, I stare out into the rain and wonder how I could forget. The remembrance of sins past used to drive me to my knees; there is such a visceral quality to the understanding of his grace when you are conscious of your depravity.

Maybe it is when you remember your sins that you understand the greatness behind the promise:

For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. ¹¹ None of them shall teach his neighbor, and none his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them. ¹² For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.”

Hebrews 8:10-12

I will remember my own sins if only it will help me remember what grace it is that He has agreed to forget.