New Year's resolutions: Learn more of the Bible

Sun, 30/12/2007 - 12:46 -- James Oakley

“But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night.” (Psalm 1:2)

“The law of God is in his heart; his steps do not slip.” (Psalm 37:31)

“I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you.” (Psalm 119:11)

Following on from yesterday’s post, another resolution I find myself making fairly regularly is to commit more of the Bible to memory. The Psalms quoted above are a motivating factor. As is the fact that Great Britain is getting more hostile to evangelical Christians and I think I should treat the possibility of “doing time” at some point in the future as a real possibility. If that happened, whatever religious access inmates at large are given, I would not expect to be allowed a Bible!

Where to start? I can’t find my source for this, but I think it was Tony and Margaret Baker shared it with us in our last term at college. For what it’s worth: Here is a method to help learning passages (as opposed to just single verses) of Scripture. Let’s suppose you want to learn Psalm 1, word perfectly as opposed to just approximately.

  1. Start with the first verse you want to learn (Psalm 1:1).
  2. Learn the verse – i.e., get to the stage where you can recite Psalm 1:1 without looking at it: “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers;”.
  3. No, that’s not verse 1 done! What you do next is say Psalm 1:1 to yourself 5 times in a row, without looking at the text at any point in proceedings. Then check with the passage to make sure you’re still saying it right.
  4. Assuming you were right, repeat the previous step two further times. If, at any point, you find you’re not quite spot on, go back to the beginning. At this point, you’ve recited Psalm 1:1 to yourself 15 times correctly, in 3 blocks of 5, checking after each block that you’re still on track.
  5. Do the same thing with the next verse (Psalm 1:2). At this point, you’ve recited Psalm 1:2 to yourself 15 times correctly, in 3 blocks of 5, checking after each block that you’re still on track.
  6. Do the same thing with the two verses together (Psalm 1:1-2). At this point, you’ve recited Psalm 1:1-2 to yourself 15 times correctly, in 3 blocks of 5, checking after each block that you’re still on track.
  7. Then you just keep going. So, Psalm 1:3. Then Psalm 1:2-3. Then Psalm 1:4. Then Psalm 1:3-4. And so on.
  8. Periodically check that you aren’t forgetting where you came from. So, say after Psalm 1:4, it’s worth doing 5-in-a-row of Psalm 1:1-4 to make sure that you’re still building the whole picture.

Taking Psalm 1 as an example, it has 6 verses. You’d learn it thus:

If anyone has tried any other techniques for memorising large blocks word-for-word, please share them in the comments space. It would be good to have as many different approaches here as possible, because I suspect that some will better for certain people, and others for others.

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Comments

matthew's picture
Submitted by matthew on

(1) Sing it. Most, if not all of us, remember song lyrics much better than stuff we've only spoken.

(2) I've just discovered how my nephew has been taught to learn his spellings, and I think it'd work as well for Bible verses/passages (or Hebrew vocab, for that matter). It's a good system because it incorporates visual, audio, and kinisthetic aspects. Assuming you want to learn a Bible verse:
(a) copy the verse out carefully
(b) look at it (briefly - just long enough to read it)
(c) say it out loud
(d) cover it over, and write it out.

ros's picture
Submitted by ros on

Great resolutions, James! I remember when we were undergraduates there was a big emphasis on learning scripture. I learned Colossians and I Peter. Sadly, I can't recite either now. A couple of years ago we learned a psalm in Oak Hill chapel. I knew it for about a week.

So I'll add this suggestion. Once you think you've learned something, have a regular programme of repetition. Say, after the first week, then every month or so. Otherwise all that effort you went to in the first place will have gone.

The other suggestion I have is that you do this with your children. At our church, the Sunday school has a progressive programme of memory verses. The first couple of years, they just learn short verses or parts of verses. Then they learn the whole verses that these came from, or couplets of verses. By the time they're 10 or 11, they know fairly long chunks of scripture and they know them well, because they started learning them years earlier. So you might choose to start with Psalm 1:3, for instance. Then vss. 3-4; then the whole thing. Over time, it builds up.

Steffen's picture
Submitted by Steffen on

Hi,

Thanks James! Following Matthew's post above, any ideas how to go about singing the psalms? It's not something the church to which I belong is going to start doing any time soon and I'm as musical as a brick, though my wife can wield a flute. Any resources out there for such a couple?

FWIW, am trying to learn some psalms in Hebrew, so any resources for singing those warmly received!

Steffen

matthew's picture
Submitted by matthew on

Let me second James's link to David's stuff on chanting psalms. It's enormously helpful (particularly if you buy the psalter he recommends). For those not familiar with how to chant the psalms, it's worth investing in the recordings of David Willcocks and the Choir of King's College Cambridge called, I think, Psalms of David.

And, further to Ros's comment, learning with your children is a great way of learning it yourself!

Richard's picture
Submitted by Richard on

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