Bible Memorization
Over the years I have done a lot of Bible memorization. Mostly a verse here and there…dealing with specific issues that I wanted/needed to improve in my life. At one point in college, I listened to a sermon from a pastor in Texas named Tom Nelson (link and link). Tom was talking about Scripture memorization, and related how after college he memorized a huge section of the New Testament…basically Romans through Jude. Just looking at the Bible on my co-worker’s desk…that is approximately 170 pages. If you quoted him a verse, he could paraphrase the verse before it and the verse after it. Wow.
So, I set up a challenge for myself in college…to memorize a book of the Bible. I choose the book of Philippians…partly because I had already memorized several verses in it, and to memorize the book I would just need to learn the connecting sections. It took me about three months, but I eventually nailed it.
Many people have commented that they would like to memorize Bible verses, but it’s hard and they struggle to do it. Over the last year, I have been memorizing Bible verses with my five year old. She memorized one verse a week for each week of last year. You can read more about that on the Bible Memory Page.
Here is the process I have gone through with her. It should be easily transferable to you. Heck…if my five year old can do it…so can you. But then again…my five year old can also deploy Vista, Office 2007, Acrobat, etc to seven computers in 30 seconds. :-)
- We break the verse up into five sections that we memorize one at a time over five days.
- I read the nightly portion of the verse (starting with the reference) to my daughter five times, and then have her quote it to me until she gets every word perfect.
- Once she has it perfect, I have her quote it perfect five times. We repeat that every night, and by the end of the five days, she can nail it easily.
- The other two days of the week we spend reviewing the verse of the week as well as a lot of the other verses that she has memorized.
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The Realm of the Verbal Processor 
That is an awesome goal, and a worthwhile one at that. My wife and I are doing Ephesians right now, and have done 1 Peter and 1 Thessalonians together. Before we met I did Jude and Colossians.
I’m starting about big with the book of Isaiah. I love the fact that so many people are memorizing books of the Bible, but I wish that they didn’t neglect what we call the old testament. Many Christians only think there are two books in the Old Testament, Proverbs and the Psalms. I want to renew the interest in Isaiah, not only because it’s the centerpiece of the Bible (in my opinion), but also because Jesus and his disciples quoted him so many times to illustrate their points. Its messages are perfect for America today because there is more idolatry in this country than ever before.
hi there – i was just doing some searching looking for folks interested in memorization. for learning just verse by verse we have created a great little tool at http://walkingbible.com which uses verses set to pictures and music to aid memorization. you can use it on your PC or iPod. we’re getting lots of great feedback – would be very interested in your thoughts if you get a chance to have a look. its totally free – we just want to make memorization fun and easy.
That is awesome, what you are doing with your daughter.
Thanks for the encouragement.