The sermon opens with the story of the sinful woman who anoints Jesus' feet at Simon the Pharisee's house, weeping, wiping his feet with her hair, and pouring out costly perfume. Jesus tells the parable of two debtors, one forgiven fifty denarii and one five hundred, and asks who will love more. Simon answers correctly that the one forgiven more will love more, yet Jesus rebukes him: the woman's extravagant love flows from grasping how much she has been forgiven, while Simon, though no less a sinner, fails to see the size of his own debt and the size of the grace shown to him. This story frames the sermon's central command from Ephesians 2:11-13: "remember." Paul instructs the Ephesians, and by implication every believer today, to remember what they once were before Christ.

The sermon poses three questions. First, what must we remember? Paul is explicit: we were once without Christ, excluded from the citizenship of Israel, strangers to the covenants of promise, without hope and without God in the world. This state stands behind God's promises to Abraham and his descendants, promises given specifically to Israel that Gentile believers had no natural claim to. The preacher illustrates this with his own testimony of coming to faith in a Chinese-language church in Jakarta through an unlikely acquaintance, stressing that everyone's path into Christ is different but all Gentile believers share this same prior condition of exclusion. To be without Christ is to be outside every promise of God; to be without God is to have God as an adversary rather than a Father, deserving wrath rather than blessing, as Paul had already stated in Ephesians 2:1-3.

Second, how should we remember? The sermon insists this is not mere cognitive recall or ability to answer catechism questions correctly, but a remembering that moves the heart and shapes present living. Several illustrations drive this home: a gambler who, refused help by his own principled brother, is instead rescued by an old friend and never forgets that kindness; the circus knife-thrower's assistant who shrugs off danger by calling it "just a trick," representing believers who treat their own salvation as unreal rather than a genuine rescue from death; a funeral director's observation that most funerals for unbelievers are marked by hopelessness beneath any talk of "celebration of life," contrasted with the real hope Christians profess; and a personal story of briefly, deliberately letting his son think he had been left behind at a fair, so as to recall the terror of loss and the relief of rescue. Practical means of remembering rightly are then offered: prayer, asking God as Paul prayed in Ephesians 1:18-19 to open the eyes of the heart; meditating on Scripture, particularly Hosea, where the reader initially rages at Gomer's unfaithfulness before realizing Gomer represents every believer who has spiritually "played the harlot" against God; observing the hopelessness and suffering of those without God, which shows what our own condition would be apart from grace; and deliberately using the imagination to relive near-death experiences, such as nearly drowning, to feel again how dire rescue by grace truly was.

Third, why does this remembering matter? The sermon addresses an apparent tension with Philippians 3:13-14, where Paul says he forgets what lies behind and strains toward what is ahead. Read in context, Paul there is renouncing pride in his own spiritual achievements and self-righteousness, not the memory of his former lostness. The two texts work together: Ephesians 2 commands remembering our nestapa (wretched) former state and the greatness of grace, which produces humility and dependence on God, while Philippians 3 forbids resting on present accomplishments, which would produce pride and self-reliance. Judges 2:7-12 supplies a warning: once the generation that had seen God's mighty works died out, the next generation did not know the LORD or what he had done, and turned to worship Baal — forgetting leads directly to idolatry and rebellion. Conversely, Ezekiel 20:42-44 shows right remembering: Israel is told to recall its own wicked ways yet also see that God dealt with them not according to their sins but according to his great name and mercy. The sermon closes by urging the congregation, entering a new year, to remember their former condition without Christ, without hope, without God, and thereby to be humbled, strengthened, and driven to press forward in dependence on God's grace rather than self-confidence.

Bible Verses Used

• Ephesians 2:11-13: the sermon's central text, commanding believers to remember their former state as Gentiles excluded from Christ, Israel's covenants, hope, and God, now brought near by Christ's blood.

• Ephesians 2:1-3: cited as the prior description of believers as dead in sin, children of wrath, whom God made alive together with Christ by his great mercy.

• Luke 7 (the sinful woman and Simon the Pharisee): opening illustration showing that grasping the size of one's forgiveness produces greater love and devotion to Christ.

• Ephesians 1:18-19: Paul's prayer for enlightened eyes of the heart, offered as a model for praying to remember rightly.

• Hosea (the book as a whole): used to show how the reader's anger at Gomer's unfaithfulness turns into self-recognition as spiritual adulterers restored by grace.

• Philippians 3:13-14: examined as an apparent contradiction to "remember," resolved by context as Paul's rejection of pride in past spiritual achievement, not of remembering his former lostness.

• Judges 2:7-12: warns that when a generation forgets what God has done, it turns to idolatry and evil.

• Ezekiel 20:42-44: shows right remembering — recalling one's own evil deeds while also recognizing God's mercy in not dealing with his people as their sins deserved.