Our Women's Ministry director has been sending a weekly encouragement since this whole stay-at-home went into effect. This week in her video message she encouraged us to hide God's word in our hearts by memorizing scripture and shared how meaningful that has been to her, especially in this time of potential anxiety for many. I was already encouraged, as I mentioned yesterday, from that Romans 8 recitation from John Piper that I shared, to pull out my notebook and start working again on Colossians. After listening to Bethany's video message, I'm even more determined to work on this again. She asked us to share what verses we are memorizing and meditating on during this stay-at-home time, so I'm using my blog here to do just that.
Besides getting back to working on Colossians, where I am just starting on chapter 2, I also am memorizing Romans 8:1 and Romans 8:37-39 to keep what we've been learning in our weekly study fresh and at the front of my thinking daily. Also, I plan to review Romans 12, which a group of us from my church in San Antonio spend a good deal of last year memorizing. Eventually, I'd like to also review Philippians, which I spent four months of 2011 memorizing and had meant to review regularly, but somehow let slide away.
Rather than let this enforced rest period continue to let me spiral or wallow, I'm choosing joy, and this is one great way to occupy my mind. I find that I need to really limit how much of the anxiety posts and conspiracy click bait that people are posting on NextDoor and Facebook that I read, and even limit how much of the news sites I'm allowing myself to focus on, and spending time really delving into memorizing the Word is a great way to bring that necessary balance and fill my mind with truth that transcends all else.
My main reason for writing this post is to encourage anyone who may read it to find your refuge in Christ and plant your thinking in His word. I'm also hoping to try to keep myself accountable to keep on with my own memorizing projects and hide God's Word in my heart. I'm thinking I may add scripture memory project to my status update posts, and hopefully keep writing them as I try to blog more, too.
What about you? Can I challenge you to be memorizing scripture that focuses your mind on the One who is sovereign and pulls you out of the darkness of anxiety and depression that is swirling around us? I'd love to hear what scripture is bringing you peace as you meditate on it.
No comments:
Post a Comment