Over and over in Psalm 119, the Psalmist pleads with God to give him life according to his word and his promise (v. 25, 107, 154, 156). In his moment of trouble, it is the word of God and the promises of God that bring him life and sustain him in it. He says that he has stored up the word of God in his heart so that he would not sin (v. 11), and that he meditates on it (v. 15) and will not forget it (v. 16). Here is a practical exhortation to put this reality to work in your life and memorize Scripture. I’m suggesting Romans 8, because of how much gospel truth is packed into these 39 verses of Scripture.

10 DAY MEMORIZATION PLAN

In order to make this simple and practical, here is a plan to memorize all of Romans 8 in only 10 days, requiring only a small portion of time each day devoted to memorization. In the morning before work or at night before bed, are great times to do this each day.

Step 1. Pray and ask God to teach you and help you focus (1 minute)
Step 2. Listen to the entire chapter on audio (takes 5-6 minutes)
Step 3. Read and memorize 4 new verses (take about 8-9 minutes)

That’s it. Listening to the whole chapter first will help you remember the previous verses you memorized, and also familiarize you with the new ones you’re about to memorize. When memorizing the new verses, try reading them, writing them out by hand, and saying them out loud. Try and recite the verses from memory after reading them once or twice. At the end of 10 days, you will have heard the whole chapter 10 times, and memorized every verse. These verses will change your life, and it was all at the cost of only 15 minutes of your time each day! Too easy. It’s not even fair.

Here’s the breakdown of verses by day, for a 10-day plan. You can easily expand this to 20 days or a month too, by only doing 1-2 verses a day instead of 4. Whatever pace you want to go, it’s helpful to have a plan, so here’s an option that might help!

Day 1 – v. 1-4
Day 2 – v. 5-8
Day 3 – v. 9-12
Day 4 – v. 13-16
Day 5 – v. 17-20
Day 6 – v. 21-24
Day 7 – v. 25-28
Day 8 – v. 29-32
Day 9 – v. 33-36
Day 10 – v. 37-39

FROM LINES TO TRENCHES

Whenever you memorize a new verse, it’s like a little line is carved into your brain. The more you read, write, and recite that verse though, the deeper and wider that line gets. After 10 days of memorizing new verses, you will have lots of new little lines in your brain, which are sufficient to help you recall the verses, but aren’t deep enough to last into your long-term memory. The goal is that once you have the whole chapter memorized in 10 days, you would continue to remember and recite these verses, digging those little lines into deep trenches from which you can pull from all of your life.

I hope this is helpful and that you accept this challenge, and that this becomes the beginning of a lifelong journey for you of memorizing large sections, chapters, and books of the Bible! There is never-ending treasure to be mined from God’s word, all of which is life-giving in the midst of our trials and temptations and sufferings, and helpful for training and equipping us for all of the work that God has for us.

Resources:

• YouVersion Bible App w/audio
• ESV Bible App w/audio
• Verses Memorization App