Andy

I want to dedicate this book to my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Through Him, I live and move and have my being. And without His Spirit dwelling in me, my desire to memorize Scripture and to stir up and instruct others to memorize Scripture would not exist. I am thankful for His living Word which He gave us, that we might grow in our knowledge, love, and understanding of Him. Table of Contents Acknowledgments 9 Introduction: Our Power to Remember 11 1. Reality Check: Imagine Life Without Your Bible 15 2. My Story: Why I Began to Memorize Scripture 29 3. Discover Your Why: Making the Case to Memorize Scripture 39 4. Don’t Let the Enemy Fool You: You Can Memorize Scripture 61 5. How to Memorize Scripture: The POWER System 85 Next Steps and Final Thoughts: Be Blessed in Your Doing 123 Scripture Memory Resources 131 Notes 141 About the Author 145 Acknowledgments I want to acknowledge my dad for his unwavering love, support, and visionary mind. If you had not suggested that I launch a Bible memory and performance ministry, and teach others how to memorize Scripture, I might have never written this book. Thank you for always showing me that you want nothing but the best for me. I want to thank my mom, who is waiting in heaven, for showing me how to live like Christ. I want to thank my step-mom, Mary Ellen, for demonstrating what it means to have a welcoming spirit and a servant’s heart. Thank you, Matthew, for introducing me to the medium of Scripture performance (i.e. Oral Interpretation) and being a great professor, mentor, and friend. I’m grateful to the many Bible performers and memory experts who’ve shared their wisdom with me, especially Aaron House of Piercing Word. I want to thank my editor, Carlene, for helping me see things that I couldn’t see and making this a better and more holistic book that can reach and impact more people. As you like to say, “You can’t know what no one has taught you.” I also want to thank Kevin and his whole team at Spirit Media who championed this book and helped me in working out the title and subtitle of this book. I am better having worked with you. And most importantly, I acknowledge my Heavenly Father for His faithfulness and kindness. By Your grace, I am what I am. 7 8 Introduction Our Power to Remember Why is it so important for us as Christians to claim our Power to Remember? To remember is so important to our faith that the verb appears more than 200 times in Scripture. Sometimes it describes how God remembers His commitment to His people. “I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind,” God tells Noah after the flood recedes (Gen. 9:15 NIV). Often it describes how God’s people remember who God is and what He has done for us. In Deuteronomy, the Lord says through Moses, “You shall remember the whole way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness” (Deut. 8:2). God does not want His people to forget Him as their Lord and their God, nor to forget all that He did in saving them from the hands of the Egyptians. And just one verse later, we see God’s desire for us to know 9 10 Chapter 1 Reality Check Imagine Life Without Your Bible Digital marketer Joshua Summers hadn’t lived very long in China before he ran afoul of local authorities and was arrested. Although he was in jail for less than a day, he quickly realized as the hours went on that all he had with him were his thoughts. He didn’t have his phone or a book, much less a Bible. He started reaching down to find what he could recite from memory, and he realized how little he actually knew. And he decided to change that, which is when he set a goal to memorize the New Testament by the age of 40. His time in jail was a reality check for him. He realized that without a text or a device, he didn’t have access to God’s Word. Because he couldn’t muster much from memory, he was without the support, comfort and guidance that God intended him to have from the Word. 11 Power to Remember “When we have the entire Bible available as an app on our smartphones, it seems an unnecessary waste of time and effort to memorize specific verses or the grand narrative of the story,” says Joe Carter of the Gospel Coalition. “By relying on technology to do our remembering for us, we have forgotten the moral aspect of memorization.”1 Science writer Joshua Foer, who became a record-breaking memory champion, learned that in the ancient world “A trained memory wasn’t just about gaining easy access to information, it was about strengthening one’s personal ethics and becoming a more complete person.”2 That is how the spiritual practice of Scripture memorization has improved Christian life and experience throughout the generations for many believers. When we invest in memorizing the Word, we allow the Word to wash over us and transform the renewal of our minds. I like to say that memorizing Scripture is never a waste of time; there will always be times when it’s not possible to have your phone or Bible on hand. Some are relatively uncommon, like being imprisoned or living where the Bible has been banned. Others are more everyday scenarios, like where you’re wrapped up in trying to calm your screaming child or meeting an urgent need at work. When you have His Word in your heart, the Holy Spirit will bring into mind just the right word, or phrase, or verse for you or for others. 12 Reality Check: Imagine Life Without Your Bible In recent times, this ancient discipline has been cast to the wayside in exchange for letting technology do the remembering for us. Sometimes we even can make excuses for ourselves, like by pointing out that the Bible itself never uses the word “memorize.” It’s true! Did you know that in the entire Old and New Testament there is not a single instance of the word “memorize”? Verses like Psalm 119:11 and Deuteronomy 11:18 use the words “hid” and “lay up,” respectively, for this concept of someone memorizing or learning God’s Word by heart, but there is no word that directly translates into the English word “memorize.” That’s partly because there is no Hebrew or Greek equivalent in the Bible, and that stems from the reality that the formal use of the word and concept of “memorize/memorization” is relatively modern. The word When we invest “memorize” was first in memorizing the used in the 1590s. At that time, it deWord, we allow the scribed the idea of Word to wash over keeping a memory us and transform alive so it wouldn’t the renewal of our be forgotten, and included the idea minds. of writing something down so the 13 Power to Remember Take FIVE Recall What do you know by memory? Is it a song? A poem? Your childhood street address? The way you grill a steak or make a pie? When did you learn it? Reflect Reflect What makes it possible for you to remember the things that you learned? What helped you to memorize them? Are there things you still commit to memory, or do you prefer to look things up quickly online? If you still memorize some things, why? Go Forward Go Forward Make a quick list of all the Bible verses or sections you know by heart. If you’d like to have more of the Word of Truth in hand day by day, pick just one new verse to memorize this week. The list of Scripture Memory Topics at the end of this book might help you choose. 14 Chapter 2 My Story Why I Began to Memorize Scripture Scripture has been a significant part of my life for as long as I can remember. From the time I was three — when my family moved to Colorado so my dad could take a lead pastor position at a church in Colorado Springs — I was surrounded by Bible stories. Being the pastor’s kid, I grew up in an environment where discussion of the Old and New Testament dominated life at church and home. I knew the answers to all of the Sunday School questions, and thought I knew plenty about God and the Word He gave us. I also knew that for the entirety of their almost 28-year marriage, my parents had daily devotions together. They would read the Bible and pray together every day. I was only familiar with the term devotions and what it meant, but I did not grasp their spiritual purpose and impact. I did not understand why regularly reading and meditating 15 16 Chapter 3 Discover Your Why Making the Case to Memorize Scripture From the time we are children, we discover that the promise of reward is sometimes all that we need to do something new or challenging. It’s the same with Scripture memorization. While we may generally understand that it’s a “good” thing to do, what moves us from thinking about it to actually doing it? I believe the following eight biblical reasons will be enough to convince you that the rewards far outweigh the “risk” of spending our time this way. 1. It is God’s will for you God creates each of us out of His infinite love and for His pleasure (Rev. 4:11). He also creates us for His purpose. When we, by faith, put our 17 Power to Remember trust in Christ, and understand what we have been saved from and saved for, our hearts are filled with a desire to fulfill that purpose - loving and pleasing God in return. J.I. Packer once noted, “In Christian living, duty and delight go together…To give oneself to hallowing God’s name as one’s lifetask means that living, though never a joy ride, will become increasingly a joy road.”9 The whole point of the Christian life is to do God’s will. To please God is to do His will, and to do His will is to obey Him. Jesus Himself says, “For whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother” (Mark 3:35). There are a few verses in the Bible that explicitly speak of God’s will for our lives (1 Thess. 4:3, 5:16-18, 1 Pet. 2:15). It is generally understood that doing the will of God includes reading His Word, praying, being a part of a body of believers to grow in Christian character, and sharing our faith, as well as doing the other works God has set before us. The reason that we should include memorizing Scripture in our daily lives is that it is also God’s will. Psalm 40:8 says, “I delight to do Your will, O my God; Your law is within my heart.” How could the Psalmist have the law within his heart if he did not have it memorized? When we have the law stored up in our heart and mind, we understand better how to do God’s will. Psalm 37:30-31 says, “The mouth of the righteous utters wisdom, and his tongue speaks justice. The law of his God is in his heart; his steps do not slip.” We can walk on 18 Discover Your Why: Making the Case to Memorize Scripture ‘‘ God’s path securely when we are rooted firmly in His Word. If you are ignorant of God’s Word, you will always be ignorant of God’s will.” ~ Billy Graham10 2. It brings you healing and comfort Life is messy. There are incredible joys in life, including the great satisfaction in following after God, but there are also unbelievable heartaches and trials. As I shared in the previous chapter, I dealt with and continue to deal with the loss of my mother. Though she passed away 12 years ago, I still continue to grieve her loss. Yet even in the midst of such trials, we can experience spiritual joy because God is the “Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ, we share abundantly in comfort too” (2 Cor. 1:3-5). At many painful points in my life, I have found that through my time reading the Word, the Holy Spirit will illuminate a verse or verses that speak to my specific circumstances. When my mom passed away, it was James 1:2-4. When I was struggling with the temptation of sexual sin, it was 1 Corinthians 10:13, and when it was the struggle of feel19 Power to Remember ing unworthy to receive God’s grace freely, it was Hebrews 4:15-16. In those moments, I have been comforted not only by the verse, but also by the presence of the Lord as confirmation to me that God sees me in my distress and speaks to me. I respond in praise and thanksgiving, and then commit to storing up that verse in my heart for future moments when I am struggling in a similar situation, so I can recall those verses to bring healing and comfort. Perhaps you have not experienced that yourself. The Holy Spirit may not always bring to light a specific verse or passage when you are going through a difficult time. In that case, I encourage you to search through the Scriptures to find verses that speak to your circumstances. You know yourself better than anyone else. You know what you struggle with most, whether it is a specific temptation, a particular trial, or other “thorns in the flesh.” Scripture is a treasure trove of verses for everyday life. When you are reading, and find a powerful verse that you want to memorize, underline it, and write it down somewhere so you will commit to learning it. If you find it too difficult or time-consuming to search for passages in your Bible, you can check the “Scripture Memory Topics and Verses” section at the back of the book which includes a few of the many resources that can help you. Regardless of how you find them, know that the Word is available to you to bring healing, comfort and encouragement that you might have hope (Rom. 15:4). 20 ‘‘ Discover Your Why: Making the Case to Memorize Scripture Delighting in God’s Word leads to delight in God, and delight in God drives away fear.” ~ Dr. David Jeremiah11 3. It brings godly success to your life Wanting to be successful in life is not a bad thing, as long as it doesn’t become an idol – something we value more than we value God Himself. That’s the danger of the so-called “prosperity gospel”: the idea that it is God’s will for Christians to experience financial wealth and physical health. I am not advocating for that. For one thing, it is not biblical, because those who want to live for God are guaranteed troubles (2 Tim. 3:12). However, experiencing godly success is a different matter. To experience godly success means to know God more intimately. As we draw near to Him, He promises to draw near to us (James 4:8), so that we might experience more of His presence. The more we get to know God, the more fulfilled and joyful we become as we draw close to the Creator of the Universe. In Joshua 1:8, it is written, “This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.” 21 Power to Remember 22 Next Steps and Final Thoughts Be Blessed in Your Doing I’ve told you that I began memorizing Scripture after my mom had passed away. First I memorized James 1:2-4, and that eventually became my life verse. A few years later, I memorized the entire first chapter of James because it was so powerful. I especially loved James 1:22, which speaks about being “doers of the word and not hearers only.” I have always wanted to be someone who didn’t just hear God’s Word but truly does and applies His Word for life transformation. I didn’t want to be like the man in James 1:23-24 who looks at himself in a mirror and then walks away and immediately forgets what he is like. James 1 continued to shape my life. I first memorized Scripture because of the hope and encouragement I received from James 1:2-4. Then, when I struggled with anger and lust as a young teenager, I knew that these temptations were not of God 23 but from my own desire (James 1:13-15). That drove me to say no to sin and to act on the things I was memorizing (James 1:22). And now, through Scripture Alive, I hope to inspire and equip others to memorize Scripture so that they also may be doers who act on God’s Truth (James 1:25). That’s why I have created the POWER System. It’s not just so you’ll learn skills to memorize Scripture but so you can grow stronger in your relationship with Christ and be able to act on the things that you are memorizing. You will thus fulfill the call of James to be a doer of the Word. As a result, you will be blessed by God in your doing. In this way, you can become a POWER-FUL witness of Christ’s work, a person who will: Faithfully share it, Use it in prayer, and Live it out. Faithfully Share It When we memorize the Word, we need to share it. This implies the significance of continually doing that. We want to be faithful to our God, for we know He is always faithful to us. His words are, in fact, life to us (Prov. 4:22) and a lamp to our feet and a light to our path (Ps. 119:105). In 1 Samuel 12:24, Samuel exhorts the Israelites to “fear the LORD and serve him faithfully with all your heart. For consider what great things he has done for you.” We know that we will never be entirely faith- 24 ful to Him at all times, but we are always striving for faithfulness. To be faithful to God’s Word, we cannot keep it just to ourselves, but are to declare His Word to others because we are called to do it. Before Jesus ascended into heaven, His final commandment was that His disciples “make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matt. 28:19-20). Therefore, let us hold fast His words, keep His commandments, and live (Prov. 4:4). Use It In Prayer There is also such power in being able to pray Scripture for yourself or for others. To pray God’s Word back to Him is something that has shaped my praying life significantly. Whether it’s a simple prayer to start the day like “Make me to know your way, O Lord; teach me your paths. Lead me in your truth, for you are the God of my salvation; for you I wait all the day long” (Ps. 25:4-5) or in times of temptation to say “I will ponder the way that is blameless. Oh when will you come to me? I will walk with integrity of heart within my house; I will not set before my eyes anything that is worthless” (Ps. 101:2-3), to have the Word ready on my lips in prayer encourages me so much. It truly allows me to be transformed by the renewal of my mind. I am meditating on His Truth and am reminded of His Truth as I pray it. 25