ILBB 3 - God Remembered 2026

I Like Big Buts

… God Remembered

Genesis 8:1-4

Series Slide

Good morning and welcome to worship!  What a great weekend we had with the ILI History Makers Conference!  It was great to worship with you and train with you.  If you attended, take a moment and stand up.

These are a few of our leaders for 2026 who came together to participate in a training opportunity from the Conference for the local churches.  We got to hear from our Conference leaders and other pastors in the area, including the new pastor at Blooming Grove and Frost, Dr. Stephen Martinez.

Our next big event of the year is coming up as well… January 25th, we will begin the celebration of our 175th year with a visit from Suzanna Wesley, the mother of John Wesley. Worship will begin at 10:30 that day so don’t be late.

But today, we are diving into our 3rdweek of our Big Buts of the Bible series.

More than we can ask or imagine…

We started looking at the fact that God has more than we can ask our imagine.  The theme verse of the series is Ephesians 2:20-21

“Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen”

In this year ahead, I am holding onto that truth of God’s word… that God has more than we can ask or imagine!

Then last week we looked at the fact that we serve a God who is rich in mercy and love.  That is for you… God loves you with a love that you can not understand.  It is beyond comprehension… no matter what we have done, we need to remember “But God, who is rich in mercy, loves us.”

Big Buts

This week we are moving into one of the children’s stories of the Bible as we move to our second Big Butsermon.  Turn with me to Genesis 8:1-4 in your Bibles.  This is quite possibly the most epic story in the Bible, and it is a story that has its origins in every part of the world. 

It is the story of the worldwide cataclysmic Flood.

God has chosen to destroy the earth, saving a remnant of humanity and animals only.  Noah and his family are the only humans to survive in the story along with 2 of every kind of animal.  The story tells us that it rained for 40 days and nights, then the waters continued to rise for an additional 100+ days.  The Floodwaters had covered the earth for 150 days when we pick up in chapter 8

Genesis 8:1-4

But God remembered Noah and all the wild animals and livestock with him in the boat. He sent a wind to blow across the earth, and the floodwaters began to recede. The underground waters stopped flowing, and the torrential rains from the sky were stopped. So the floodwaters gradually receded from the earth. After 150 days, exactly five months from the time the flood began, the boat came to rest on the mountains of Ararat.

<Prayer>

But God remembered

Before we get into the meat of the message, I wanted to share something with you.  Sometimes our kids or our grandkids will come home from school talking about this passage… and, for you students, you may hear that the story of Noah’s Ark is just a mytho-poetic story made up by the Hebrew people.  We may be told that it’s just one of many flood stories from around the world.

The Native Americans of the US have a cataclysmic flood story.

The Asian cultures have a couple of flood stories, one involving a man who had a boat and rescued the animals as the flood waters rose.

The one we hear about most often is the Gilgamesh Epic of the Assyrians.  The Akkadians and the Sumerians all have similar stories.  Each of the stories have similarities, but the biblical account shows a God that is not irritated by the sin of humanity, but was greatly grieved.  God wasn’t tricked by another deity, our God intentionally saved humanity from the flood through Noah.  Noah didn’t attain immortality like the Babylonian story, but God did make a covenant with Noah.

Here's what I want you to understand about these stories.  I, and many other scholars, don’t believe the Biblical story of the flood was a copy of the other stories.  I don’t believe that these other stories prove that the story of Noah is a myth.  In fact, I believe the opposite.  I believe that these other stories from around the world prove that there was a cataclysmic flood that did happen.  The fossil record demonstrates this… the strata of the earth’s crust confirm this… I believe that a remnant of animals and people in different parts of the world survived the flood and passed the story down from generation to generation.  Each story is unique, but with similarities.  What we read in our Bible is the account of the Hebrew people and how God spared them, how God remembered them.  And that is our first point… God remembered.

God Remembered

When we think of the word remembered, it usually involves the fact that we forgot something… I forgot my kids at school, but then I remembered and went and got them… or I forgot where my keys were, then I remembered where I left them.

Science fiction is full of opportunities to play with this idea of forgetting and remembering.  Arnold Schwarzenegger was in a movie in 1990… they did do a remake, but the remake isn’t near as good as the original.  In the movie, the main character is a man by the name of Douglas Quaid who keeps having nightmares.  In the futuristic world of 2085, people can have their minds reprogrammed… they can literally have the past wiped away and new memories implanted.  Quaid decides to have a new memory, a vacation to Mars, implanted… not realizing his mind had been wiped previously and the new implanted story would literally mess with his mind… and now he is having a total recall.  I guess you could say, he remembered his past life… what was forgotten is now remembered.

That’s the idea we get when we think of remembering, we think of recalling that which is forgotten. 

It’s like the story of the soldiers who thought they had been forgotten as a prisoner of war. 

It’s like the worker in the factory that feels the boss has forgotten about him.

It’s like you and me…. Feeling lost and forgotten.

In The Handbook of Genesis by the United Bible Society, we read that the fact that “God remembered Noah does not mean that God had forgotten him and then recalled his situation to mind.”  Reyburn, William David, and Euan McGFry. 1998. A Handbook on Genesis. UBS Handbook Series. New York: United Bible Societies.

That’s my next point…

God has not forgotten

We look at our lives at times, and we feel forgotten… The illness… the injury… the finances… the relationship… the war… I could go on and on with all the things that happen in our lives that make us think we have been forgotten by others or forgotten by God. 

In this story, God remembered means that God has not forgotten Noah.  The Handbook of Genesisgoes on to say that the word Zakar or “Remembered in this context means taking merciful action in regard to someone who is threatened or in trouble… “God had not forgotten” is a negative way of expressing something of this idea in English.”

It’s more like saying God thought about Noah. It is a concept that not only means remembering the past, but it’s like saying “God remembered Noah’s future.”

It makes me think of many people’s favorite passage from Jeremiah 29:11, “For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.”

God knows your past, and God knows your future.  God has not forgotten you. God sees more of you than you know.  God knows you, God knit you together in your mother’s womb.  God knows the hairs of your head, God knows the freckles that no one else sees… God knows you from the inside out.

God has not forgotten you.

When you are worried about paying all the bills… God has not forgotten you.

When the diagnosis and the prognosis aren’t what you hoped for… God has not forgotten you.

When the treatment isn’t working… God has not forgotten you.

When the job is coming to an end… God has not forgotten you.

When your children don’t call you… God has not forgotten you.

God remembers you… God sees your past, the present, and the future… and God is working in all that to bring about something new and good in and through you.  God knows the plans he has for you… and they are good and hopeful.

One thing I have learned over that past couple of years… God is doing a new thing!

God is doing a new thing

Look at our church… God is doing a new thing. A big part of that is those of you who gather each week to pray for this church and this community.  We have a group of ladies who gather on Tuesdays to pray for this church, this community, and those in need around the world.

I want you ladies to know that God is honoring your prayers… There is a revival taking place here… we have new people coming to this church… our attendance is up in all of our services.  We have people finding ways to be in community together, serving together, and worshiping together.  We are sharing our resources and spreading the good news of Jesus through the ministry of our First Methodist Women as they share the resources from the Bazaar.  We packed and sent more shoe boxes for Samaritan’s Purse than ever before!

God is doing a new thing here at First Methodist and I am so grateful to be a part of it!

In the book of Isaiah, we read about God’s words sent to the people through the prophet.  They have been in exile for years, and God begins to tell them that in the midst of their exile and captivity, God is at work to bring about their salvation.  God is making a way where there is no way… a way for them to return to the land they were promised… then we read these words:

Isaiah 43:19

For I am about to do something new.

    See, I have already begun! Do you not see it?

I will make a pathway through the wilderness.

    I will create rivers in the dry wasteland.

Whatever you are going through right now, I want you to know that you are not alone.  We serve a God who is at work right now… Whatever your exile looks like… Whatever you are held captive by… God is doing something new… God is bringing about your salvation…

Ladies and gentlemen… God remembers you.

Whatever it is, the past that haunts you… the sins that you can’t forgive… the illness that plagues you… the injury that troubles you… the turmoil in your family… whatever it is… you can name it… you can talk about it… you can list it all out… as long as you follow it with this fact… as long as you follow it with this “Big But.”

But God remembered…

God remembers you.

And, right now, in 2026, God sees you: past, present, and future… and with God that future is full of hope and promise.

God has more than you can ask or imagine in this year ahead… God is doing a new thing!

So I ask, what is God doing in you?

Take a few moments this week and name what it is that has held you back in 2025.

Name the sin that so easily entangles you.

Identify the ailment, the illness, the injury that you are facing and dealing with!

Then write these words behind them…

But God remembered.