MEMORY AND TRUTH

Two middle-aged couples were enjoying friendly conversation when one of the men asked the other, "Fred, how was the memory clinic you went to last month?"

"Outstanding," Fred replied. "They taught us all the latest psychological techniques, such as visualization, association and so on. It was great. I haven’t had a problem since."

"Sounds like something I could use. What was the name of the clinic?"

Fred went blank. He thought and thought, but couldn’t remember. Then a smile broke across his face and he asked, "What do you call that flower with the long stem and thorns?"

"You mean a rose?"

"Yes, that’s it!" He turned to his wife, "Hey Rose, what was the name of that memory clinic?"

In Psychology, memory is an organism’s ability to store, retain, and recall information and experiences. In the Bible, the Greek word to remember is aletheia. Aletheia literally means to "not forget." And in the King James Version and many other translations of the Bible, the word aletheia is also translated as “truth.”

So truth, in the Bible, literally means to not forget. To know the truth means to remember.

(From a sermon by Paul Zwarich, Tonight We Remember, 4/15/2011)