Testimony:
For years I felt guilty for not regularly making time to be in the Word, NOT because I didn‘t love and value the scriptures. I did. But the tyranny of the urgent seemed always to prevent quality time in it. Then I made a commitment to memorize scripture in my random moments, to control my thoughts and to not waste time in uncontrolled thinking. So I carried chapters of scripture with me wherever I went, and learned to apply my mind to it while doing other things.

Over the years, using what otherwise would have been wasted moments, I have memorized Ephesians, Colossians, Hebrews, James ( in two versions), I and II Peter, I, II III John, chapters of Romans and Galatians and the gospels, the first half of I Corinthians, many Psalms, and other portions of O.T. This is an embarrassed confession. I could have, should have, and wish I had done so much more. (I’m not through yet!)

MEMORIZING GOD’S WORD is His Idea
God says of His Word, “Hide it“, “treasure it” in our heart, “eat it”, “diligently seek” it, ( Jer. 15:16, Matt. 4:4, Heb. 6:5, Ps. 119:1-3), “bind it” on us (Deut 6:6-9), “meditate on it day and night” (Josh. 1:8, Ps. 1:1-2); cause it to “richly dwell in” us.
Col. 3:16 “Let the word of Christ richly dwell within you, with all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God.” 

(Practically) HOW TO MEMORIZE GOD’S TRUTH:
Deut. 6: 6-9 “And these words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart; and you shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up. And you shall bind them as a sign on your hand and they shall be as frontals on you forehead, and you shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.” This is a practical how to do, as well as a what to do. We learn better as we are going and doing.

HERE IS HOW TO START:
1.Photocopy the pages of your selected passage. Or print them off from a Bible website and CARRY IT WITH YOU EVERYWHERE, to refer to “as you go”.

2. Select a chapter or a book of scripture, not a single verse, and disregard the verse numbers. (If you memorize a chapter you will remember which verses are in it, and you can turn to verses in it easily without the number “address”; if you memorize a book, you will know what is in each chapter by the time you have it memorized.) Forget the numbers. They are unnecessary. This is liberating!

3. Memorize in the translation (not a paraphrase) that you regularly use. Over time this will help you memorize faster as the cadence, sentence structure, etc. become familiar.

4. Memorize word perfectly, until you can recite the words flowingly not haltingly. Until you do, you have not really memorized it, and you will not retain it. You are not memorizing thoughts, but words, or else you are in danger of applying your own thoughts to His Word. The goal is to know His thoughts (Him!) through His words. 

OBJECTIONS: THE “YEAH BUTS….”
Our self-indulgent flesh can think of lots of excuses, to at least put off this discipline: 

“I can’t memorize“...You have memorized your phone number and address, your friends names and numbers. You obviously CAN memorize what is important to you.
Prov. 4:20-23 “My son, give attention to my words; incline your ear to my sayings. Do not let them depart from your sight; keep them in the midst of your heart. For they are life to those who find them, and health to all their whole body.”
Rom.8:5-8 “For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward god for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so; and those who are in the flesh cannot please God. However, you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you.”

“But I don’t have time”: It takes no time out of your day. “As you go” is using the time you are already spending on something else. It takes discipline; but it doesn’t take time that you don’t have. It uses time that you waste. Is God’s Word important enough to put before random thoughts? “Taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ” is not about time! 

“But I don’t get anything out of it”: Going over and over the words in our neocortex creates new neuronal paths in our brain that future scripture will join to for insight. This is how we cooperate with the Holy Spirit to be “renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new self”. Eph. 4:23-24. To memorize is meditation even if sometimes it seems like mindless rote and just a difficult discipline. “Line on line, word on word, precept on precept” is God’s way. And not one second of it is wasted. It is seed sown for a harvest.

Isa. 55:6-13 “Seek the Lord while He may be found; call upon Him while He is near. Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return to the Lord, and He will have compassion on him, and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon. For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, declares the Lord. “For as the heavens are higher than the earth so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts. For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there without watering the earth, and making it bear and sprout, and furnishing seed to the sower and bread to the eater; so shall My word be which goes forth from My mouth; It shall not return to Me empty, without accomplishing what I desire, and without succeeding in the matter for which I sent it. For you will go out with joy, and be led forth with peace…” 

“But I need help” A buddy for accountability requires time, scheduling, and increased complexity. For me it is better to challenge MYSELF, and commit to and answer to GOD. This builds intimacy with Him. He rewards me in secret. Remember, as soon as you COMMIT to renew your mind, He will step in to help and bless you in it. The Lord Jesus demonstrated that he knew all the Scriptures by heart. He quoted them at every turn. He was humbly diligent to consistently think only the Father’s thoughts in his human brain, not trusting His own, and He is the best one to hold us accountable. Say His own words back to Him, to delight Him.

The most important thing is to be a doer of the Word.
James l:21 “…putting aside all filthiness and all that remains of wickedness, in humility receive the word implanted, which is able to save your souls. But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was. 25 But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man shall be blessed in what he does.”

Prov. 22:17-21 “Incline your ear and hear the words of the wise, and apply your mind to my knowledge; for it will be pleasant if you keep them within you, that they may be ready on your lips. So that your trust may be in the Lord, I have taught you today, even you. Have I not written to you excellent things of counsels and knowledge, to make you know the certainty of the words of truth, that you may correctly answer to him who sent you.”

The treasure we are seeking is Christ Himself, the living Word.
(Col. 2:1-3 “ For I want you to know how great a struggle I have on your behalf, and for those who are at Laodicea, and for all those who have not personally seen my face, that their hearts may be encouraged, having been knit together in love, and attaining to all the wealth that comes from the full assurance of understanding, resulting in a true knowledge of God’s mystery, that is Christ Himself, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.”

John 5:38-40 “And you do not have His word abiding in you, for you do not believe Him whom He sent. You search the scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is these that bear witness of Me’

Luke 24:25-27 And beginning with Moses and with all the prophets, He explained to the things concerning Himself in all the Scriptures….31-32 And their eyes were opened and they recognized Him; and He vanished from their sight. And they said to one another, were not our hearts burning within us while He was speaking to us on the road, while He was explaining the Scriptures to us?” 

Your ability to memorize will increase exponentially, as you commit to memorize God’s Word.
The Lord to His followers: Luke 8:18 “Therefore take care how you listen, for whoever has to him shall more be given and whoever does not have, even what he thinks he has shall be taken away from him.” Here is a principle: “He commits to you, so that you will commit to him, so that He can commit to you”.

 

Rae Edlin