“I have hidden your word in my heart…” So wrote the author of Psalm 119, encouraging us by his example to commit Scripture to memory. Or as our own Anglican Collect puts it: Blessed Lord, who caused all holy scriptures to be written for our learning: help us so to hear them, to read, mark, learn and inwardly digest them…
There is so much going on the world – so much bad and anxiety-inducing stuff – that displacing some of this input with the Word of God would be no bad thing. Or perhaps in our struggle to be godly, some of us are finding this time a particularly intense battle – Psalm 119:11 actually goes on to say “I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you”.
Why not begin or renew the habit of learning passages of scripture? Three options: Small, Medium or Large…
- SMALL – Psalm 86:15. This is the verse we will keep coming back to on Sundays in our all-age slots over the next month – a wonderful description of the Lord.
- MEDIUM – Philippians 2:5-11. This passage is the heartbeat of Paul’s letter – a wonderful Christ-centred passage to commit to memory.
- LARGE – the whole letter of Philippians. Not in one go! – but each week as we cover short passages in sermons, try committing them to memory during the following week. The process of trying to learn something really helps to ‘inwardly digest’ it.
This YouTube video has some really helpful advice on how to learn a passage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2ToVKfLVoU
And I’ve found this app helpful on my phone: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.millennialsolutions.scripturetyper
Let me know how you’re getting on!
Joe
