2 Peter 1:5-8: “For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love. For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
At Life-Spring, we’re now on our third memory verse for the year. For some of us, the idea of memory verses might bring us back to when we were kids and memorizing verses was part of the program. But there’s a much deeper reason for why we’re memorizing scripture, and doing it as a church.
First off, we’re not working on memorizing scripture simply because it’s what we’re supposed to do as Christians. While memorizing verses for the sake of memorizing them may be an okay way to start, this is not the end goal. Memorizing verses is not really about making us better Christians or more holy people!
Rather, we memorize verses as a way to meditate on God’s word (Joshua 1:8). Having scripture memorized allows us to meditate on it in a way we could never do by just reading it. Somehow, committing something to memory has a way of getting it more deeply into our hearts and minds. In this way, memorizing and meditating on God’s word can transform us. God often speaks to us through verses that we’ve committed to memory, and these can sometimes be revelations that we never forget. Memorization has a way of helping us internalize scripture so that it becomes more a part of who we are.
Imagine what would happen if the whole church were to focus on memorizing the same verses of the Bible. We would not only be transformed as individuals, but as a church. In the same way memorization and meditation can help us internalize scripture as individuals, it can also help us internalize scripture as a church. It would become part of who we are, part of our identity. And that’s the reason why we select the verses we do. Whether it’s the greatest commandment (Matt 22), the first commandments (Exo 20), the fruit of the Spirit (Gal 5), or what to add to our faith (1 Peter), these are the verses that we want to become part of our DNA.
May God never stop transforming us through memorizing scripture. Let’s put our best foot forward, and do it as a church family. We’ll be amazed at how deeply it can change us.