Having made the decision to accept Jesus Christ as my personal Lord and Savior, living in community, living with my brothers and sisters in Christ, is crucial to the spiritual journey. When the church gathers, and for most of us most often that means on Sunday morning, we come together from our various walks of life, and notice how in almost all churches, we begin this Sunday morning ritual with memory work. We hear the scriptures read. In fact, notice how often in church gathered the word remembrance or remembering is used. We are a people gathering together to remind ourselves who we are.
Memory work is in a sense identity work.
If you've ever met a person with amnesia, they may be functioning beautifully. They may be talking, they may be laughing, they may have a perfect heart rate, but they will not be able to tell you who they are. Memory is the source of identity. The church gathers together to do memory work, to remember how it is they have come to know the presence of God in ages past. We read from the Old Testament more than two thousand years ago.