Rememberizing: Part 2

This topic of rememberizing (memorizing and remembering the Word of God) has been occupying the forefront of my mind these days. As a matter of fact, I'm completely enthralled by the practice of it. Recently God has challenged me to memorize a larger piece of text (the entire book of Colossians to be exact). I must confess that I blew Him off for months, thinking there's no way I could do it. But He persisted - and when He persists like that I've learned it's best to obey. Now.

I approached a friend for help and she offered to memorize with me. What a gift!
Accountability. Check.
We got together and came up with a plan. Check.
The starting day came. I was nervous but I got verse one down. Check.
We're one month and one chapter in and let me tell you: I am AMAZED. Blown away! Verse by verse, God has opened my mind to learn, absorb and retain. It is crazy and humbling and so very precious to me.

So, from someone who is in the thick of it right now and loving it - I urge you do this! Allow God the opportunity to dazzle you with His ability to feed your mind with Truth. He does NOT disappoint!

Need a few tips?

1. Start where you are. What are you going through right now? Overwhelmed and exhausted? Find verses on strength and rest. Consumed with insecurities? Focus on verses about your identity in Christ. You get where I'm going with this. Use the topical index in the back of your Bible to find Truth that applies to you right now.

2. Come up with a plan and commit to it. This discipline is not about being legalistic. It's not a duty. It's about choosing to invest in the process of renewing your mind. So, decide what's doable for you. One verse a month? One a week? One a day? Make your plan and stick to it.

3. Find some accountability. It helps to know someone else is there - someone doing the work with you. Accountability helps keep us motivated and focused. Find a friend or a Bible study group to memorize with you.

3. Memorize according to your learning style. If you are a visual learner, slowly read over the verse as if you are taking a picture in your mind of each word. Read it at least 10 times, then practice without looking. If you learn by listening, read the verse out loud 10 times or record yourself reading it and listen to it over and over. If you are a tactile learner, write the verse five times, then see how you do without looking.

4. Practice, practice, practice. In the car. In the shower. Making dinner. Going to bed. Write it on sticky notes. Write it on your mirror. Put it on the dash board of your car. Practice your verses until God has inscribed them firmly on your heart.

If you need someone to keep you accountable - tell me! I'd love to encourage you and cheer you on as you pursue His Word. THIS is my happy place!

Today's challenge: Start!

Rememberizing - Part 1

Yep. You read that right.
Rememberizing.
It's a word created by my daughters - a cross between remembering and memorizing. They have no idea that it isn't really a word and I kinda love that about it. Plus, I love the word because I have come to appreciate the exercise of it - of remembering and memorizing the Word of God.

A couple of years ago, God used this verse to light a fire in me for His Word ...
Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful. Joshua 1:8

Now I could go on and on about the importance of rememberizing the Word of God - but you can get that teaching anywhere. Instead, let give you my why. This is why I prioritize the discipline of wallpapering my mind with God's Word.

1. My mind is sick. It can not be trusted. It needs the Word of God like an infection needs antibiotics.
2. I do not have the natural ability to memorize. I had to ask for it. Even if you don't want it, I dare you to ask God to give you the desire and ability to absorb and retain His Word. If you do, it will change your life. Forever.
3. As soon as I began rememberizing, I couldn't stop! Our minds were created to contain the Word of God. I'm sure of it!
4. God's Word is changing my mind. It really is living and active, and it's power to renew the mind is - well - mind blowing!
5. It is how God most often speaks to me. By His Spirit, God uses His Word to teach, guide and comfort me. I don't ever want to lose the ability to hear. Ever.

More on rememberizing soon! Until then - Get in the Word, girls!

Face to the Floor Challenge

Come, let us bow down in worship, let us kneel before the Lord our Maker; for he is our God and we are the people of his pasture, the flock under his care. Psalm 95:6-7

It's been a long time since I've bent low - knees on the carpet and face to the floor.

My short-lived morning routine of submission has long been lost among alarm clocks, sack lunches and school bells. Months have passed since she suggested we try it. (Could it have already been a year?) She said something like, "This one act - this spiritual discipline of old - it will change you. It will change your everything. Just try it."

The challenge was this: Each morning after your peel yourself from the warm embrace of your sleeping place, hit your knees. Bow down, head to the floor, and confess your love to the Father. Submit your day and ask for His leading.

It's an act of the will to start the day low.
A humble beginning to focus the heart.
The kind of morning that honors and glorifies before anything else ...

So I'm saying out loud that I will commit again, and I challenge you to join me. We'll call it our Face to the Floor Challenge. And each morning as we rise, we'll hit our knees and thank our Father. We'll confess our need and yield our day. Then back up again, we'll embrace the day and see what He might do.

All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because, "God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble." 1 Peter 5:5

Today's challenge: Commit with me to do this for 30 days - will you? God will honor this early morning routine of humility!

For a large case of the grumps ...

I woke up this morning with my flesh screaming. I was grumpy - I knew it - and I didn't care. I was in the mood to wallow - to stew and spat for no good reason at all. I'd like to say I was having a bad day, but the only thing bad in my day was me. When a mom needs a time-out, where does she go? Who's going to put me on my bed, close my door and give me some time to think about the choices I'm making?

About half way through my day I decided I had gone on like that for long enough. I looked at myself in the mirror and heard myself say, "Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God. My soul is downcast within me; therefore I will remember you..." Psalm 42:5-6

I knew the verse but needed to see it again - small words written in black and white - words to inscribe on my heart. My soul lifter. This is how we practice - how we work to apply Truth even when our feelings are screaming for control. Go to the pages. Practice Truth.

My prescription for a mommy-sized case of the grumps (according to Psalm 42)

1. Choose God. Fix my eyes on Him. Wait in hopeful expectation for Him. For His presence.

2. Choose Praise. Not because I feel like it but because He is worth it. All of the time.

3. Choose to remember. Remember His goodness, faithfulness and tender mercies. He never fails. Ever!

My kids are thankful for the Word of God because it has the power to change their mommy. Even when she has a bad case of the grumps!

Lies

The other day I was bombarded - beat down by the lines that played tirelessly in my head. They were lies and I knew it, but the tears came just the same. In no time at all I felt unraveled, and it made me mad. I was in church, of all places. I was in church, and I felt trapped under the heavy weight of self doubt. Scrambling, I wrote a note to my husband about the all consuming madness in my head. He wrote back, "Tell Satan to take a hike."

"We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ." 2 Corinthians 10:5

How often do you do battle against the lies that Satan plants in your mind? I wish I could say that I'm over it - that I have this whole thought life thing all figured out - but the truth is I battle. A lot.

So what does this battling look like? How do we "take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ?" It's very "spiritual" of us to quote scripture and say we're doing battle with Satan in our thought lives, but what does this taking captive every thought really look like?

Here's how I picture it:

1. A thought comes into our minds.

2. "Hold that thought." Take it captive. Why? Because we need to make sure we are only allowing Truth to pass through the threshold of our minds. This step has to be intentional. Just as we don't let just anyone who approaches our door come into our homes, neither should we let every thought walk through the door of our
minds.

3. Hold the thought up to the Light of God's Word. Is it sound? Does it line up with the Truth of God's Word? If it does, then by all means let it in. But if it doesn't, bind that thought up and throw it away. It has no place in the mind of a child of the King. (Quoted from my study, The Wardrobe of Christ)

Can you see how important it is that we know what's lining the pages of our Bibles? When we take the time to wallpaper our minds with His Word, the Spirit of God will enable us to recognize Truth and decipher it from the lies. It's our single best defense against the lies of the evil one.

Today's challenge: Be more intentional today about your thought life ... that means you have to take time to think about what you are thinking about. How do your thoughts measure up to the Truth in God's Word?

Just Released!!

The sight of the UPS truck rolling down my street makes me excited these days ... excited like kid at Christmas! And yesterday, that big brown truck dropped of a pile of boxes loaded to the brim with pretty red books that looked just like this:So much for March ... my Bible study is OUT!
If you are local, let me know if you would like one for you or for your next group study, and I'll be happy to deliver it to you. Otherwise, it can be purchsed at Amazon or Barnes and Noble. (Amazon is a little slow in getting the cover image up, but you already know what it looks like :)

To know more about what the study is about, click on the "books" tab at the top of the page.

Thank you, my friends!

All HIS Might!

Yesterday I sat on my couch and listened to five children at play. They played and I sat, exhausted. A day can do that to a mom. In their game of house, one of the girls pretended to be the mom and I wondered if she was tired too. Was she worn out by the daily routine like me?

Today I started my day soaking in Colossians and I landed on this verse:

"being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, joyfully ... " Colossians 1:11

My answer was there in black and white.

If I want to joyfully parent with great endurance and patience, I can no longer rely on my own "pull yourself up by the bootstraps" kind of strength. No more "grin and bear it". No more "grit your teeth and get through". Nope.

I need the power of my Savior - ALL power - the power available only according to HIS glorious might. It's the only kind of strength that will do.

And so here I sit once again, but this time marvelling - admiring - in awe of Jesus who is willing to exert all His glorious might today just so that I can display endurance and patience with joy.

That touches the heart of this mom. Does it touch your heart too?

Today's challenge: Before I start my day running, will I bend low and ask for this supernatural strength - all power according to his glorious might - so that I might have great endurance and patience?