Go and cry in the ears of Jerusalem, saying,
Thus says the LORD: I
remember you, the kindness of your youth,
the love of your espousals,
when you went after me in the wilderness,
in a land that was not sown.
Jeremiah 2:2
"This was the word of Jehovah to his ancient people; he remembered the faithfulness and earnestness of Israel when the nation was first born,....Some of us were converted to God when we were very young, and we look back with pleasure on our early days. But, whether we look back on them with pleasure or not, God does so, and he says, “I remember you, the kindness of your youth, the love of your espousals.”
Why does God remember and prize so highly the early piety of his people, their first faith, their first love, their first zeal?
I think that it is,
*first, because all these were his own work.
*God also remembers with pleasure those best things in his people’s early days because they gave him great delight at the time. It seems a strange thing to say, but it is strangely yet blessedly true, that it gave God great pleasure to see us repent. Those first tears, which we tried to brush away secretly, were so precious to the Lord that he stored them away in his bottle.
*Besides this, the Lord so remembers the best things of our early days that he recounts them.
*Now, to show how strong the Lord’s memory is of all that was good in his people at their beginnings, he gives a detailed account of it. He says, “I remember you, the kindness of your youth.”
*Then the Lord adds, “I remember you, … the love of your espousals.” Oh, some of us loved God very fervently in our early days!
*GOD REMEMBERS WITH A GRACIOUS PURPOSE THE BEST THINGS OF OUR EARLY DAYS. He remembers them so that he may make use of and honor us in our later days. Do not neglect the least thing that you see to be in the Scriptures; but determine to follow the Lord fully. If you do that, you will be the kind of man that God will use; there are plenty of young men who are pliant as the willow, they will bend to anything and anyone;
*I believe that the Lord also remembers what we do in our youthful love and kindness, so that he may sustain us in the time of trouble. I especially think that this must be true in the time of old age. That is a sweet prayer of David, in the seventy-first Psalm, Oh God, you have taught me from my youth: and so far I have declared your wondrous works. Now also, when I am old and grey-headed, oh God, do not forsake me.
*Oh, come back! I charge you, by the living God, return to the place from which you have gone astray. Do you not owe more to God now than you did then?
*For, look, you have already slipped a long way down. Why, looking up, I can hardly see how high you used to be; you were so near heaven’s gate, and you have come down, oh, so far!
---What faults do you have to find with God, that you have left him?
---What fault have you seen in the ever-blessed Christ, that your love for him should have grown cold?"
Charles Spurgeon
