Dad loved to fish and spent many hours of his long life sitting quietly waiting for the fish to bite. If the fish were biting at all, Daddy could catch them, even if no one else did. And most of the time, Mom was right by his side.
He knew the spawning patterns of fish and how the fishing was affected by the weather. He could talk on all aspects of fishing, along with the experts. He had probably fished for most fresh-water fish of North America, but never fished in the ocean. He would fish from the creek bank, from a bridge, from a heated dock, or a pontoon boat, not matter, as long as he was close enough to the water to drop a hook in.
One of my earliest memories is of playing along the shallow bank of the creek, where the rocks were smooth from endless years of water rippling over them. And I remember lying in the back of a station wagon at night while my grandparents, Mom, and Dad talked and fished by moonlight.
When I was very small, Dad caught a giant catfish in a creek near our hometown. I remember that when he held it out at arm’s length, the tail dragged the ground, meaning that since Dad was about 6’2″ tall, the catfish was about 3′ long. When I mentioned it to him once after I was grown, he said, “But you were too little; you couldn’t possibly remember that fish.”
Maybe I just thought I remembered it because I saw pictures of it, but I don’t think so. Research has proven that memories are formed in the smallest of child.
In Jeremiah 31:34, God says, ” For I will forgive their iniquity and their sin I will remember no more.”
In Psalms 103:12, “As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us.”
And in Psalms 105:8, “He remembers His covenant forever.”
It isn’t that God forgets our sin, as much as He remembers His covenant to forgive us. When God forgives us, He chooses to remember our sins no more.