One of my goals this year is to spend one hour a day, seven days a week, working on memorizing new Bible verses and reviewing the old verses I have already memorized. To keep myself motivated, I review the benefits and blessings that come into my life from this discipline. The first one is that the discipline of memorizing does for my brain what weight lifting does for my physical body; working my brain hard by memorizing keeps me from becoming senile. A second blessing is that God’s living, active, supernatural Word will give me a healthy, growing soul and heart. Psalms 19:7 The law of the Lord is perfect, restoring the soul;

A third benefit is that I will become increasingly more wise. Wisdom is knowing the best thing to do and say in any circumstance God sovereignly puts me in. I need much wisdom as a pastor, as a husband, as a father, and as a grandfather. Psalms 119:98-100 “Your commandments make me wiser than my enemies, For they are ever mine. I have more insight than all my teachers, For Your testimonies are my meditation. I understand more than the aged, Because I have observed Your precepts.”

A fourth reason to spend an hour every day working on memorizing the Bible is that I will sin less and less as God’s supernatural words work in my heart. Psalms 119:11: “Your Word I have treasured in my heart, that I may not sin against You.”

A fifth powerful motivator for me to work hard at memorizing the Word of God is that I will know God intimately. The Apostle Paul declared that everything in life was garbage compared to knowing Jesus Christ. The command to seek the Lord is given in the Bible over a hundred times. Most of the commands to seek God have a blessing attached, such as in Psalms 34:10: “The young lions do lack and suffer hunger, But they who seek the Lord shall not be in want of any good thing.” But the best blessing is that if we seek the Lord, we will find Him, and if we draw near to Him, He will draw near to us. 2 Chronicles 15:2 The Lord is with you when you are with Him, and if you seek Him, He will let you find Him. James 4:8: “Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you.”

The best way to seek the Lord is in His Word, and to memorize it, meditate on it, and hide it in my heart is a very effective way to seek Him with all of my heart, soul, mind, and heart.