Today (16th of Feb) I was reading Psalm 119 and it brought back some memories. I am blessed to have been encouraged to memorise scripture since I could talk.
My first memory verse came from a bookmark I got when I joined the Cradle Roll at Morley Baptist Church… Psalm 103:2 Bless the Lord,O my soul and forget not all His benefits. Mum and Dad even have a tape of me saying it as a little girl – my version was
Bless the Lord
and do not forget (geget)
how kind He is
Mum had us learning verses at home, in particular I remember the ones we learnt while at Grandma and Grandad’s house in 1990. 1 Peter 3:4, Phillipians 4:5
At school we had memory verses which we’d write out with our spelling test on Friday. In year six in particular I can remember my fellow students asking me to recite it for them the morning of the test, as the teacher would take down the poster with the verse on them the night before, and I would often already know the verse from home or church.
For (home) school each month we’d memorise 10 or so verses in a passage, I found that very challenging! Plus each workbook in each subject had a character trait and memory verse together, these were all in King James version, so I learnt new (old) words all the time. “Ensample” (meaning example) is one of my favourites!
Dad worked hard to memorise scripture, with many little cards and what I called the “Graham Okely Handwritten Version” (sheets of notepaper with scriptures written out on them). His method for memorising Psalm 119 was to photocopy it, and paste each stanza onto a small piece of card. On the way to evening church services he would quote from it and I would read along – prompting him where necessary. He’d do 8 or so stanzas at a time. WOW!
Another memory was reading and speaking scriptures in the first person from Peter Tan’s God’s Meditation Food Book – you can actually download it now in PDF form if you are interested.
I’m thankful that I have much scripture to draw on in hard times, and I hope that Emily too will grow up in a home covered in the word of God.
I’m amazed that I’m keeping up with this challenge and hoping that after 90 Day the habit of reading the word each day will be part of my makeup.
Melissa