Miracles of Memory
When you want to express an idea, your mind instantly sets in motion a complex intellectual machine. It recalls the desired idea, extracts it from the tangled maze of facts and events in your memory, selects the appropriate words, orders them according to the rules of grammar, then activates your tongue to speak or your fingers to write. In this way, numerous actions and interactions take place within the mind at an incredibly high speed. Almost all the senses contribute to this process.
The fact is that your mind is filled with countless ideas, but if you have to express even one of them in English, you must first select the appropriate words from the jungle of the quarter million words which make up the language, after which you must put things in the correct order with unbelievable speed, and only then are you are able to utter or write down a meaningful linguistic sequence. This process is unimaginably complex, with numerous known and unknown processes going on in your mind at lightning speed. It is the interaction of these factors which results in meaningful speech or writing.
How does this all this take place? Recent research shows that there is an incredibly complex system in our mind, which is dependent upon the memory – a super-miraculous phenomenon of nature. According to Neal Barnard, an adjunct associate professor of medicine at the George Washington University School of Medicine, in Washington, D.C., “A memory is made by linking two or more of the 100 billion nerve cells in your brain, called neurons, then solidifying the connection so that you can use it later.” And “your brain continues to develop neurons and build new connections to strengthen memory as you age, a phenomenon called neuroplasticity,” says Brianne Bettcher, a neuropsychology fellow at the University of California, San Francisco, Memory and Aging Center. (Nine Ways to Improve Your Memory, Fox News, December 18, 2013).
People talk of the great miracles of the past, like the staff of Moses, the ring of Solomon and so on. But, there is a miracle even greater than these which has been bestowed by God upon every single person. This is the miracle of the mind. If you recognize this as a personal miracle, you will develop such a thrilling sense of gratitude that all complaints and protests will seem ridiculous and, moreover, superfluous. You will then live with feelings of eternal thankfulness to God.
