His Word in My Heart

In the middle of June last year I listened to Revive Our Hearts radio broadcast and I heard a woman, Janet Pope, the author of His Word in My Heart, being interviewed.  What I heard that day has changed me forever.  Here is part of the transcript I listened to that day:

Nancy:  Describe for us kind of what your life was like at that point. What was the setting, the backdrop, for how you got into this matter of Scripture memorization?



Janet: I’d love to tell you about it. It began in 1991. We moved from living in Dallas, Texas. We’d been there for eight years, and we were moving to Hattiesburg, Mississippi.


Nancy: Quite a difference there!


Janet: Yes. My husband grew up in Mississippi, so for him, we were moving home. But for me, I was going to a totally foreign place where I didn’t have any friends, and the first few months were very, very lonely for me. I just cried out to God, hoping that He would bring about a change in my life.


Well, at about that time, some of my new friends invited me to go to a Christian conference in Chattanooga. It’s about a six-hour drive, and I thought, “If nothing else, I need a break from the ‘mom routine.’”


Nancy: How old were your children at that time?


Janet: They were four and seven.


Nancy: You had your hands full.


Janet: One was in school and one was still at home. So anyway, one morning of the conference, a woman from the audience was called up to the front spontaneously and asked if she would share some Scripture with the group. She then quoted the entire book of Colossians for all of us.


I just sat there dumbfounded. I was mesmerized by what I’d heard, and I thought in my own heart, “I wonder what it would be like to really know God’s Word, to have it so embedded in my heart and mind that I would carry it with me wherever I would go.”


I had been a Christian for 14 years. I was 35 years old. I had not grown up in church, but I considered myself a very sincere and dedicated Christian.


I read my Bible every day, but I saw at that moment how shallow I really was. I really didn’t know God’s Word. I wasn’t a serious student of the Word, so on the six-hour drive home, I cried out to God and asked Him to make a change in my life.


I thought, “Okay, two small kids, I have no extra time slots in my day.” But I reasoned in my mind that if God wanted me to get to know His Word, then He would make a way—that He wouldn’t ask something of me and then make it impossible to achieve.


Because this woman had recited the whole book of Colossians, I thought, okay, maybe I could memorize Scripture. So I thought, “With God’s help, I’m going to start on Ephesians.”


It took me months and months—probably about six months—but I worked on it every single minute of every day and night. I found that even though I had no extra time slots in my day, I could memorize while I was doing other things. So I included Scripture memory in my morning routine—getting in the shower, blow-drying my hair, putting on makeup and clothes.


Those were times when my hands were busy but my mind was free. So I was able to memorize Scripture while I was doing the household chores—vacuuming, folding laundry, emptying the dishwasher, making school lunches, making coffee, things like that—I could memorize at the same time.


Not only was I getting to know God’s Word, but I was redeeming the time, just a minute here and a minute there. That’s really where I began.

Before the broadcast was over Nancy asked Janet to quote Ephesians One.  She did.  I listened with a heart of conviction.  I did not know the Word of God in that way, and hearing Janet quote Scripture, and hear the testimony of what memorizing chapters and books of the Bible had done in her life stirred my heart to do the same.  Just as Janet was challenged as she listened to the woman at the conference to come to know God’s Word, I was convicted to begin memorizing.  I began working on my favorite book in the Bible – Philippians. 

Last Sunday my husband asked me, as part of his series on the importance of memorizing the Word of God, to recite the book of Philippians.  By God’s grace, and for His glory, I was able to do so.  I’ve had many come to me with the same response that Janet and I had as we listened to Scripture being quoted – saying that they’ve been challenged to do the same.  Praise the Lord.  What a joy to see this trickle-down effect.  It has nothing to do with me, Friends.  It is only by God’s grace that we can do anything.  Even as  Philippians 3:13 says, I must forget that which is behind and reach unto that which is before.  I don’t sit and dwell on the fact that I memorized Philippians; Monday morning I began working on Titus…pressing forward.

There’s no quick method to memorizing – it comes after much diligence, but I took some of Janet’s tips on memorization and have added couple of my own that I would like to share with you if you are inclined to work on a passage of Scripture.  Many times we just need a little help about the how to’s to help get us started.

• Write the verse (or chapter) down on 3×5 cards.  Use the little notebook with a spiral or a ring that holds the cards together.  Writing them out is one aid in memorization.  Having those cards with you will allow you to review them whether you’re sitting at a traffic light, in the doctor’s office, vacuuming, folding clothes or hulling strawberries.  Look carefully at the picture of my berries.  Just above the sink, on the windowsill are my verse cards.
• I read the whole verse out loud a couple of times until I have an understanding of it.  Then I begin memorizing a phrase at a time until I have the whole verse down.  Then all day long go over it out loud.  Repeat it again and again.
• As you learn a new verse, connect it to those that preceeded it – out loud.
• Another tool you can use is your phone – if you have a video recorder or a voice note tool.  I used the voice notes and will read a passage.  Then to review, I play it and recite the passage along with my recorded voice.  You can do the same thing with a Bible site like Bible Gateway.  Pull up the audio version of a chapter and recite it with the reader.
• It might also help to have someone who will hold you accountable – a partner who will listen to your verses and encourage you.