#ThursdayThings — Scripture Memory Tools
A few weeks ago, my sister Myrissa shared about how scripture memory has made such an impact on her walk with Christ. She also wrote about the spiritual discipline of memorizing long passages, chapters, and even books of the Bible. That may seem like a daunting task to someone who has no regular scripture memory habit, so I wanted to share a few tools that both Myrissa and I have used to grow in the discipline of scripture memory.
Memorizing with your phone
Your phone is probably always with you, and you are constantly flipping through your apps. Why not add a scripture memory app to your home screen? Myrissa and I use an app called “The Bible Memory App” that is super simple to use. After importing the verses that you want to memorize, you then type the first letter of each word as you practice it. The app helps you to learn it by progressively showing you less and less words from the verse until you can type it all from memory. You can also categorize them into folders according to chapter or subject. My favorite feature is that it notifies you to review a verse, so that you don’t “forget” that verse you memorized a year ago. You can record yourself saying the verse, create flashcards, draw an illustration of the verse, and much more. We use a paid pro version that allows for unlimited verses, but the free version still has all the features you’ll need to start memorizing both single verses and long passages.
Memorizing with your toddlers
This is a new area of scripture memorization for me, and I am open to any tools that you may have to help our young family! One of my favorites tools to use with my two-year-old is the Scripture Memory Journal for Kids from Daily Grace Co. There’s nothing fancy about these spiral-bound notecards with Bible verses, but it’s a beautiful and helpful reminder to keep on my kitchen table for my daughter and me to practice each morning. Since she’s so young, we take it slow as I fill in the smaller words for her (and incentivize her with gummy vitamins). While she may not know the full meaning now, I am planting the seeds of God’s Word within her to grow as she gets older. I also have heard wonderful things about the Foundation Verse Pack from Truth:78. These are great for pre-readers because instead of just listing the reference on one side of the notecard, it has a picture to prompt the child to remember the verse. I plan on getting these for our family soon.
Memorizing with notecards
Probably one of the most tried and true ways to memorize scripture is by writing the verses on notecards, but Myrissa has a unique way of doing this that has helped her as she learns verses. On one side of the card she writes the whole verse, and on the other, she writes the first letter of each word. The letters help prompt her to remember the next word. She also copies the letters onto her hand or wrist to prompt her to practice the verse throughout the day. While we haven’t used this particular tool, I have friends who have used a similar method by purchasing temporary tattoos with the first letters of each word in a verse printed on them. The important thing is to review these verses regularly, so Myrissa keeps a notecard box and divides the verses by the day she will practice them. Even when memorizing longer passages, she writes each verse on its own notecard, taking the long passages one day and one verse at a time.
As most of us look at several more weeks of social distancing and quarantining because of the coronavirus, this is a great time to use the extra time to build more spiritual disciplines into our life. I pray that these tools will help you grow in scripture memory, letting the word of Christ dwell in you richly.