Practical Advice on Memorizing the Bible - Ask Pastor Tim

This is a Bible memorization question.

"Hello, Pastor Tim, I'm a
21 year old young man

who is wanting to grow closer to the Lord

and Scripture memorization is something

that I feel the Lord is really pushing me

to get started on.

I notice that you're a
very passionate teacher

of the Word of God and have spoken

of how you spent the
years of your singleness

growing in the Lord

and memorizing Scripture -

singleness being a circumstance
I can relate to at the moment.

My question is how did you go about

memorizing Scripture

and do you have any practical advice

on storing up the Word
of God in your heart?"

So I guess the first thing,

is there anything Scriptural

that you can think about where God

actually tells us that we
should memorize Scripture?

(from the room)

It doesn't use the word
"memorize" but it's implied.

Tim: Where would something like that be?

(from the room): Colossians 3,

the Word of Christ dwelling richly in you.

Tim: The Word of Christ
dwell richly in you.

Or you think about
maybe some of the things

like David said about -

I've stored up the Word in my heart

that I might not sin against you.

Things like that.

Maybe I'll ask Kevin this question.

Kevin, have you ever come across

any preachers that think

that Bible memorization
isn't maybe something

that we should even do?

Kevin: No.

Tim: You've never come across that?

Kevin: A preacher who doesn't think

Bible memorization is
something we should do?

Tim: Right.

Kevin: No one comes to mind.

Tim: Okay, good.

So then I'm not going to deal with that,

because I actually have come across that.

Storing up God's Word in our heart -

that's obviously a good thing.

Now, yes, it's true,

you can store up that Word in your heart

where perhaps you have an idea

about the truth of the Word.

Or you could store it up word-for-word.

And obviously even there

how that is stored up is
going to depend somewhat

on the translation that you memorize.

But I would say this,

obviously letting that Word
abide in your heart;

obviously the importance
of the Word of God

in the life of the Christian.

Let's throw some verses out

that have to do with the importance

of the Word or God's commandments

or Jesus' commandments

in the life of the Christian.

Throw some at me.

(from the room): It's not a commandment,

but I think it's a really good example

of Jesus in the wilderness.

Tim: Right. That's a big one.

Because what does He do?

He quotes Deuteronomy 3 times

doing battle with the devil.

And by the way, we ourselves -

we're going to get to this one day

in Ephesians 6 -

but we're told that as we gird ourselves

with the armor of God,

one of the weapons -

in fact, the only offensive weapon

is the sword of the Spirit,

which is the Word of God.

So you're to take that.

You're to take it up.

Not only in your hand;

it is to dwell in the heart, in the mind.

Throw some Scriptures at me

that talk about the importance

of Scripture in the life of the Christian.

(from the room)

Well, this is Old Testament,

but Moses commanded like you said

I think in Deuteronomy

that the king should meditate

on the law of the Lord day and night.

Tim: So the king was commanded to do that.

(from the room)

Grow up into salvation - 1 Peter 2,

as we feed on the milk of the Word

like newborn babes.

Tim: It's able to equip the man of God.

Right? Isn't that what Scripture says?

We're sanctified by it.

"Sanctify them by Thy Word;
Thy Word is truth."

Scripture.

Jesus said, "If My Word abides in you,

then are you My disciples indeed."

Scripture.

So, store it up in our hearts.

Okay, this young man is asking

about maybe some principles,

some ideas.

I think that the first thing

is to do what we're already doing.

It's to emphasize the necessity.

It's to emphasize how important this is.

You know, when you have an idea

that something is really important -

really important - and you're convinced

it's important;

you're convinced that it's necessary,

that's a big thing right there.

If you're not so convinced,

if you kind of take it casually,

that right there is probably
the first step to defeat.

But one of the things that
I would just say about it

is I often walk in the morning

over by Brackenridge and I pray.

And one of the things that I do

is I'm preaching right now

about halfway through Ephesians 3

and so I will recite Ephesians 1, 2, and 3

as I'm walking.

And what that does is it
allows you to meditate.

When you're memorizing Scripture,

it allows you to meditate

because you're playing it
over and over in your mind.

Unlike when you do devotional reading.

You may stop somewhere
and re-read something.

But when you're memorizing,

you're playing that thing over and over

and over in your mind.

Can you tell me any Scriptures

that talk about meditating on the Word?

(from the room)

Oh, how I love your Law.

It is my meditation all the day.

Tim: Anybody think of Psalm 1?

The blessed man.

It says he meditates on His law

day and night.

But meditation.

Pat Horner was my pastor

down at Community Baptist Church.

He said he memorized Scripture this way:

Like, "Paul an apostle of Christ Jesus."

He would emphasize each word individually.

"Paul..." an apostle of Christ Jesus

by the will of God.

Paul "an" apostle...

And see, he would put stress

on each of those words
as he moved through.

That's very helpful.

Now I recognize, you know,

putting the stress on the article

might not be so significant,

but what's happening every time

you stress a word,

is it's bringing that
word to the forefront.

It's not getting lost.

You know what happens sometimes

when we're reading devotionally?

Certain words and certain ideas get lost.

You go over them.

And you know what happens?

You start thinking about
something you just read,

and you're playing it over in your mind,

and you're still reading.

But you're thinking about
what came before

and you just missed.

But when you memorize,

that's not going to happen,

because you play it over and over and over

so many times in your mind,

and what will begin to happen

is things will begin to stand out to you

and it's extremely profitable.

One of the things I would say about it

is pick your translation carefully.

I mean, try to memorize

from a translation that
as best as you can tell

you're going to be reading
when you're 60 years old

if you live that long.

I did a lot of my original memorization

in the King James.

I was in the King James about 10 years

and the New King James two years.

And I've been reading the ESV ever since.

I did read the NAS cover
to cover one time.

I read the Holman Christian
cover to cover one time.

But a lot of times when I quote Scripture,

it's an amalgamation of things.

Craig and I just went for
a bike ride a little earlier

and we were talking about
our memories failing.

And Craig said, "Yeah,
I'm forgetting Scripture."

And it's like sometimes I don't even know

what I'm quoting,

if I'm quoting King James or ESV

or just some mixture that I've created

in my own mind.

But I've memorized a lot from the ESV

and a lot from the King James Bible.

And it's okay. That's okay.

You want to hide the Word here.

If you like the old English

or you don't like the old English.

But it's probably best that you memorize

from the translation that you read

and that you're likely going
to continue to read.

That's one thing to think about.

You know, as you do this too -

memorizing Scripture -

it's very convenient.

Because what can happen is

like when I'm walking and
praying at Brackenridge,

I don't have my Bible with me.

Now, to be fair, I have my phone

and there are sometimes I forget,

or as I'm memorizing new material,

I have to bring my phone up

and look up that Bible verse on my phone.

But it's nice when you're
memorizing Scripture.

You can recall.

This may not happen, but I always think,

if I end up in prison with no Bible,

at least I'll have all the texts that
I've memorized with me.

And so you can be playing
those things in your mind

just about anytime.

You can be running Scripture
over in your mind.

And you know what happens?

Scripture talks about renewing your mind.

Or have you ever read

washing with the water of the Word?

When we run truth through our minds

the mind is transformed.

And it grows.

I mean, you think about Jesus saying,

"Sanctify them by Thy truth;
Thy Word is truth."

It sanctifies. It cleanses.

It purifies.

It does something to us.

And the Spirit of God sees to it

that that actually happens.

One of the last things I would say

is consistency.

Look, if you start memorizing something,

you have to be consistent.

It doesn't mean you have to
work on it every single day,

but you do need to have consistency.

I'm not trying to memorize

the whole book of Ephesians

every single day,

but probably once or twice a week,

I work on it.

And you have to go back and rehearse.

That's one of the things,

the more Scripture you memorize -

like I heard John Piper say

I've forgotten more Scripture

than I presently have memorized.

So he's memorized a bunch

and forgotten it.

You say what's the use then?

Listen, while he was memorizing it,

he was meditating on it.

And you know what?

Even if you forget the exact verbiage,

if you misquote Romans to me,

I know.

If you misquote Ephesians to me,

there may be something I've forgotten

in a part that I haven't
worked on in awhile,

but if you misquote it, I know it.

It brings a familiarity

even though you may have lost

some aspect to it.

So just incredibly profitable.

But be consistent.

Anybody have anything they want to add

that might be helpful?

One thing I would say is this,

don't be afraid to memorize whole books.

I mean, sometimes you
can approach Scripture

as though, oh, well, I'm going to work on

ten different verses.

Okay. That's okay. And you should.

Isolating certain verses

or certain portions of Scripture...

and I would say this,

be wise.

Just don't go start memorizing

the book of Numbers.

Don't memorize Revelation.

Memorize portions of Scripture

that are going to be useful to you,

to your soul, to your faith,

to your prayer life,

to defending against the devil

for the rest of your life.

Memorize strategic verses,

good verses,

verses that you're going to want to recall

again and again and again
throughout your life.

Verses that when you're evangelizing,

you're going to want to be able to recall.

Be strategic.

But don't be afraid of whole books.

I mean, if you can memorize
the whole book of John,

you will be way better off for it.

Charles Leiter told me

he memorized Romans

and his roommate memorized Hebrews

and since they were helping each other

and quizzing each other,

he said he basically memorized Hebrews

and his roommate basically
memorized Romans.

Can you imagine having
Romans and Hebrews?

And if you want a lesser task,

Ephesians is a great one.

Portions of Isaiah.

You can memorize the Gospel of John.

Memorize the Sermon on the Mount.

Memorize the Upper Room discourse.

The Upper Room Discourse

is basically John 14, 15, 16,

and then His high priestly prayer in 17.

Those four chapters are phenomenal.

Be strategic. That's what I would say.

Anybody have anything else
they want to add to that?

(from the room)

Before I got more into school online,

I used to be a technician in training.

So what I used to do to help me

because I couldn't really
pull out my Bible

from time to time,

usually I would wake up early
in the morning and read

and if there was a Scripture
that stood out to me,

I would write it on a piece of paper

and keep it in my pocket,

so I'd pull it out from time
to time throughout work

and it would help me meditate upon it.

That was one thing that helped me.

Tim: Yeah, you know,
we're all wired different.

And some of us have more

photographic memory tendencies

and some less.

Some have to work harder

and some not as hard.

And we all are wired
a little bit different.

We need to strive to use what works.

But the thing I would say is try.

Experiment.

And see what works and pursue it.

You will be so much better off

when you have a head
filled with Scripture.