Some of our most valuable possessions are our photo albums. When today’s youth age they will sit and browse through electronic files of digital images of days gone by. Those of us who have logged more than a few decades instead sit with crumbling paper albums filled with pasted fading brownish pictures of people standing straight with arms at their sides staring at the camera. Under the pictures the person in the family with the nicest handwriting wrote in names and dates. “Aunt Cora with Uncle Emil – 1911.” It is the one thing we cannot replace when a home is destroyed.
I have grown up listening to preachers tell me that once in heaven I will not remember anything about earth. They usually quote Isaiah 65:17, “The former things will not be remembered, nor will they come to mind.” But where there is no memory there is no wisdom. I do not think Isaiah was speaking of God performing some memory purge. If that would be the case Jesus would not eternally bear the scars. They are there lest we forget. Surely all Isaiah was saying is we shall be so occupied with wondrous things we will not dwell on the past. We have all had such wonderful days never once did we think of our troubles. Heaven will not be burdened with memories of troubles but to forget will only cause us to repeat the foolishness that began all this woe.
History courses are a significant part of a good curriculum so each generation can do better than past generations. There is a sweet nostalgia in browsing old photo albums. Remembering the way we were adds to the richness of the way we are.
Written by Roger Bothwell on January 8, 2015
Spring of Life, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94574
Rogerbothwell.org