Zakar, Remember and Speak.

So I'm reading through The Silence of Adam by authors Larry Crabb, Al Andrews, & Don Hudson. It's a book about the lost art of manhood, etc. I was struck by something Crabb says in the book.

He says that in Genesis Chapter 1, one of the words used to call Adam is "zakar." Now zakar is a hebrew word for "remember." Now in most English Bibles, we've translated zakar in Genesis 1 to mean male, but zakar in that context actually means the remembering one.

So Crabb et al, ask the reader: why would men known from the beginning as the remembering one?

Ever since reading that and being introduced to the word zakar, I've been thinking a lot about how remembering plays into manhood.

Ever since I came across the question of "What is manhood?" I've been stumped. I've looked in many different directions (careers, dating, sports) and failed miserably at all of them. I've essentially come to the decision that I, for all intents and purposes, am not a man.

I'm like boy or maybe a golden retriever.

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When I was a senior in high school, my brother was a freshmen on the high school football team. He didn't play because he was a freshmen, but he traveled with the team and stood on the sidelines to cheer on his football brethren.

One night I remember being at home with my parents when my mom got the phone call that my brother had started to have severe stomach pains on the sideline and was taken to the ER. They weren't sure what was wrong with him, just that before halftime, he had collapsed to the ground in extreme pain.

I don't remember the car ride to the hospital. I remember being in a very tiny waiting room. Smaller than some dentist offices I had been to. I remember waiting with my brother, whose eyes were swollen from tears that had come from the intense pain in his stomach; and my mother who was stoic, yet fearful. We waited while the doctors ran tests and checked out my brother for perhaps a busted appendix or some sort of acid-blooded, alien parasite.

I remember sitting in the waiting room and praying silently to myself. I didn't believe in God at the time, but knew that I needed to beg something--even an imaginary something--for help. I had never really prayed before, but that night I prayed intensely and bitterly. Begging God that my brother would be OK and threatening Him with what I would do if any harm came to my brother.

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Remember.

Having God refer to us men as the remembering ones is something to not take lightly. "Remember that I was with you in catastrophe." "Remember that I was with you in victory."

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The Bible is full of repetition. It used to drive me nuts the way the Bible would recount time and time again what God had done. Most books will tell you something and then assume that if you forget, you can flip back to that passage. But in the Bible, we repeatedly have prophets quoting prophets earlier in the Bible; Jesus quoted the Old Testament frequently.

There's something about remembering. Not just in your head, but out loud. Remember and speak. Remember and speak. Don't just get nostalgic, but tell others about what God has done for you and through you and with you and to you. Tell about what you've seen and heard and read of God doing. Remember and speak.

So I remember tonight that in that ER, my brother got a clear bill of health. The doctors couldn't find anything wrong with him and he never had another pain like that again. I arrogantly wrote it off as a fluke, a medical anomaly; instead of calling it what it was--an answered prayer. Tonight, I remember that God is good. Not just because he saved my brother from what could've been cancer or something horrid. I remember that God is good because he gave my brother a clean bill of health AND he helped me realize how much I cared about my brother AND because God humbled me (a blind cynic) enough for me to realize how much I needed Him.

I can look back and see how that night was an assault on the walls I had put up around my heart to keep Him out. God staged one of the first battles of many that night.

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So remember, remember what God has done. Remember that He is always good. Remember that even in your suffering, you have a God who loves you and who invites you to take comfort in Him.

Remember and speak.

Don't just remember and move on--share. Share the hope with others. Take joy in remembering and--just like a funny story that you tell everybody who will listen--tell God's story until you've told it to everybody...and then tell it again.