Good morning. Well, according to that clock, I have six minutes left to teach. So, what a blessing that that's not there for me to look at. So, when we get done at 1030, it's not my fault. All right, we've been talking about spending time with God, and our current lesson is, do I really need to memorize scripture? Do I really need to memorize scripture? We asked some questions. First one was, why should I memorize scripture? I'm not gonna rehash that. You can remember that or go back and look at that. The second one is, what are some benefits of memorizing scripture? And we gave a couple thoughts there that it can cleanse and renew your mind. It can strengthen you to resist temptation. It can sweeten your disposition. I'm sure nobody needs that, right? It can stabilize your walk, and it can help you to happily follow God's will, and it can assist your prayer life. And then if you turn to 1 Peter 3, we will look at the next one. And if you have a handout, it's letter G in your outline. So, what are some benefits of memorizing scripture? We'll look at a couple more here and then answer a few more questions. So, this one 1 Peter 3, verse 15 says, "...but sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear." Let's pray. Father, again, we're grateful to be in Your house today. We're grateful that we get to Look into the Bible, ask the Lord that some of these things, as we read it, that You would help make application and help us to see how to apply Your Word and these thoughts and have a better, more successful Christian life as a result, Lord. Lord, we're fallen people. corrupt by nature. You know that. And I'm thankful that your mercies are new every morning, that you care for us, you want to help us. And I would ask, Lord, that we gain some strength and encouragement from being here today. We ask this in Christ's name. Amen. And so, the point is this, it can enable you to extend hope to others. Another reason, then, for hiding God's Word in our heart, memorizing scriptures, that it can enable you to extend hope to others. Wouldn't it be nice? You ever see needs out there? You say, boy, that person really needs this. I wish I had a million dollars. I'd give them, you know, 10 grand to help them with that problem over there. And I wish I could help with this and wish I could help with that. Well, we've got something far more valuable than cash. We've got the Word of God, which is truth, which can change lives, help people, and we can actually carry a whole lot of that. Remember, the beggar was there, and Peter said, silver and gold have I none. but such as I have." He says, I got something better. And he was able to help him with something spiritual. And that man went walking and leaping and praising God. He was excited because he got something far better than money. He got something that would help him, and it was something from God. And so we have the opportunity to help people along the way. It's nice if you have the Bible handy, it's nice if you can open it, but there are certain circumstances, maybe you're working alongside someone on an assembly line, and you're talking, they're sharing their heart with you, and you can't just whip out the New Testament and start preaching to them or encouraging them, but you can have God's Word in your heart, to be able to give to them. And so that verse there, sanctify the Lord God in your hearts and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear. So how do you get ready for something? He says we're supposed to be ready always. How do you get ready for something? Usually you have to prepare to get ready, right? You have to ready yourself. And so, part of that would be getting Scripture in our hearts and minds. And obviously, when we're dealing with a loss, the unsaved, it's helpful for us to memorize verses about the plan of salvation. that'll help you to witness to people when you don't have a Bible, when you're just in the midst of a conversation. You say, well, those verses don't help me. I think sometimes we get the idea that memorizing, we only memorize verses that help us with our weaknesses and problems. And yes, that is very helpful, but that's not the only reason why we should be hiding God's word in our heart, because there are other people who have needs too. And so sometimes we memorize scripture so that we can help other people with that scripture. And such is the case with having portions of the plan of salvation committed to memory. And then obviously, you know, the Bible is called the sword of the Spirit. It's what God uses to prick hearts, to produce conviction, again, to cut to the heart. And so, you ever get in a discussion with people or a debate, and hopefully it doesn't turn into an argument about things about, you know, God and the Bible? You know, the best thing you can do is use the Word of God. It's not your intellect that's going to win an argument. but to sow the seed with the Word of God, and the Word of God is what produces conviction. And Hebrews 4.12, right, for the Word of God is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword, right, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and of the joints and marrow, and is the discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. So God's Word gets in there, and it discerns, it helps, and because God uses His Word, it would be a shame if we weren't skillful swordsmen in handling His Word. So the better we know the Bible, the more effective we can become to evangelize the lost and also edify fellow believers, other people who are just going through a hard time, and you can give them a little word of encouragement. And it goes a long, long way. Now, if you turn with me to Luke chapter number two, we'll see the next point. Luke chapter two, and we're gonna see some other passages in here in the gospel of Luke. But this one, this idea, another reason why we should memorize scriptures is because it can make you more like the Savior, make you more like the Savior. Did you know Jesus knew the Bible? He knew the Scriptures. And one way we can be more like Him is to know the Scriptures also. In Luke 2, verse 52, the Bible says, And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and man. So he increased in wisdom. He increased. He was God, he knew everything, but he also chose to increase. We need to increase in our wisdom and we can do so by learning more and more of God's words. Here he had astounded the men in the temple by knowing the scriptures. Not that we're out to astound people with our knowledge, but we can increase and learn the Scriptures more and more. Why don't you turn with me to chapter 4, maybe a little more practical thought. And if you've been in church any amount of time, You've heard preaching or sermon out of Luke chapter four, and you've seen the importance of knowing the word of God and how to resist the devil. But here Jesus was being tempted by Satan, and he resisted all of these temptations by quoting scripture. Hmm. Worked for him. Maybe It would work for us. Maybe, of course it would work for us. And again, another reason why it's very important for us to know. So we'll pick it up here in verse number one. And Jesus, being full of the Holy Ghost, returned from Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, being 40 days tempted of the devil. And in those days he did eat nothing. And when they were ended, he afterward hungered. The devil said unto him, If thou be the son of God, no, if he was, command this stone that it be made bread. And Jesus answered him, saying, It is written." I like that. It is written. How did he know it was written? He pulled out his scroll from the Old Testament, right? he knew it. He had it in his heart. He had memorized it, and he knew how to apply it. And that's the key too, right? It's not just knowing and having committed something to memory, but being in tune with the Lord, and when the Lord brings something to our memory, we can bring it back and use it. But he says, it is written, the man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God. So he fought off the temptation with scripture. And the devil, taking him up into a high mountain, showed unto him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. And the devil said unto him, all this power will I give thee in the glory of them, for that is delivered unto me, and to whomsoever I will. I give it, if thou therefore wilt worship me, all shall be thine." Well, everything was his already, but so how does he respond? And Jesus answered and said unto him, get thee behind me, Satan, for it is written, it is written, thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, in him only shalt thou serve. Have you ever had a conversation with the devil? Have you ever talked to the devil? It's like, that's weird. It's not weird. You should talk to the devil and his demons and tell them, hey, leave me alone. This is what God said and I'm not gonna listen to your nonsense. Resist the devil and he shall what? He'll flee. And so you should talk to the devil. And when you do, Again, don't bring your arguments and your wisdom and all that. You just bring what the Word of God says. And you can fight off the devil and his temptations by combating him with the Word of God. Again, how did he fight? Jesus fought with the Scripture. How did he know the Scripture? He had it in his heart. And the more we're equipped with the Word of God, we've got the sword of the Spirit, the better we will be able to defend ourselves in the day of temptation in the evil day when the devil comes after us. And, of course, there was a third temptation, and you can—we won't read all of those verses, but look at there in verse 12, And Jesus answering said unto him, It is said—again, the same idea that it is written—Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. So here comes the temptation, and each temptation was a little different, and so each response was a passage of scripture, it was the word of God. And so it's helpful for us to have some different verses memorized to help battle different temptations. That's why I think I've mentioned in the past, if you know that you struggle with a certain area of your life, Which is actually, that's a comical statement, a certain area. The areas that you know you struggle with, it's good to have some things to fight back with. Make that long list, and then maybe get a verse or two for each of those that you can have hidden in your heart, and the Lord can help bring it back to you. And you can not just rehearse it, and that's good, rehearse it in your own heart and mind. But there are times, sometimes, you just say, devil, leave me alone. God said this, and I'm going to believe God, and I'm not going to believe you, and I'm not going to listen to you, and you have to leave. You can do that. Not only can you do that, you should do that. You say, well, I don't do that. Well, you should do that. You should do that, because the Bible says resist the devil. That's kind of an imperative. So if you don't resist the devil, then what are you gonna do instead? Tolerate him, embrace him? I think we need to get back to biblical Christianity and learn to fight back and be a little bit more militant in that sense. Now, turn with me to Luke 24. So we're here, we're seeing the Savior. He increased in wisdom, and so can we. He used the Scripture to fight off temptation, and when we're tempted, we'll be helped by having God's Word in our heart. And then in chapter 24, we see two disciples In verse number 13, and behold, two of them went that same day, this is after Jesus had died and had risen, to a village called Emmaus, which was from Jerusalem about three square furlongs, a little over six and a half miles or so. It wasn't too far, but that's still a long way to walk. And they talked. all of all these things which had happened. And it came to pass that while they communed together and reasoned, Jesus himself drew near and went with them. But their eyes were holding that they should not know him. They didn't know it was him. And he said unto them, what manner of communications are these that you have one to another as you walk and are sad? So why are you sad? Well, what's going on in one of them? whose name was Cleopas, answering, said unto him, Art thou only a stranger in Jerusalem, and hast not known the things which are come to pass there in these days? And he said unto them, What things? And they said unto him, Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, which was a prophet mighty indeed in word before God and all the people, and how the chief priests and the rulers delivered him to be condemned to death and have crucified him. But we trusted it had been he which should have redeemed Israel. And beside all this, today is the third day. since these things were done." Yeah, the third day, something was supposed to happen on the third day, right? He was supposed to rise again, and he did. And they're depressed, they're discouraged because, and this is the third day, yay! And certain women also of our company, which astonished us, were early at the, who made us astonished, which were early at the sepulcher, when they found not his body, they came saying that they had seen a vision of angels which said he was alive. Yeah, and not only did he say he was going to rise again after three days, people actually went and verified it and were still sad. Isn't that human nature? Sometimes we just want to be sad. We just want to be down. And God gives us all the reasons to be happy and encouraged. We say, yeah, but. Yeah, well, that's just the Bible. And certain of them which were with us went to the sepulcher, and found it even so, as the women had said. But him they saw, and they said, and some of us went, and yes, it's true, his grave was empty, just like he said, and just like they said, and were still sad. Then said he unto them, O fools and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken, ought not Christ to have suffered these things? and to enter into His glory. Now, here's the point. That was all important to help us to understand what was going on. They're down, they're discouraged. This kind of goes back to our last point, right? Being ready to give a reason for the hope that is in you. They had no hope. They were all down and discouraged. Jesus had lots of hope, and He's going to encourage them. And how's he going to do it? Through the word of God. And I like this in verse 27, and beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures, the things concerning himself. So he gives them, I mean, you think you come to church and you hear some long preaching sometime. He gave them, a sermon from Genesis through the prophets and talked about all the things. Do you know how many things are mentioned about Jesus? in the Old Testament? If you do, let me know, because I don't know. There's so many. There's just, it's countless. I know there's people who've made lists and all this. There's hundreds, yay, thousands of references in different ways to Christ. And he expounded onto, and you say, well, he knew the whole Bible. True. Not likely you're gonna know the entire Bible as well as Jesus. I get that. But the point was this. He knew the Scriptures, and because of that, He was able to help them, and what did they say in verse 32? And they said one to another, did not our heart burn within us while He talked with us by the way and while He opened to us the Scriptures? Now, I get it. It's the Lord's job to open the Scriptures and illuminate the understanding, but it's our job to give out the Scriptures. And he was able to just share the Word of God. He said, well, I can't share as much. As much as we can share, if people have an open heart, it can help them. Their hearts will burn, sometimes in anger, sometimes in conviction, and sometimes it produces repentance and we are not responsible how people react to what they hear. All we're responsible is to give out the word of God. So, that's just another good reason why we should be able, why we should try to have the scriptures in our heart. Now, as I mentioned before, even if you have portions of verses, you know, when I'm, in a tough time, or I'm in a bind or something, God does not always flash the whole verse in my heart and mind. Sometimes it's just a phrase that comes to my heart and mind. I'm glad that I've taken time to memorize some whole verses, but sometimes it's just a portion of that verse that's gonna come to my mind. And even if you only had a phrase that's gonna help and bail you out, that's okay. I struggle, sometimes I get some words backwards. Okay, work at it, amen, work at it. And I'll give you some encouragement with that in the next point here. But it's God's word. He can use it how he wants to. And I'm glad that he's a gracious, merciful God. So let's do the best we can and least attempt to get some of his words in our heart. So let me get to point number three. I only took how long to get through the first two points or outline, but those were the pointed points. Now we can move on. Number three, will God help me to memorize Scripture? That's a good question to ask. Will God help me? Or am I alone at this? Do you think He'd help us? I mean, if He wants us to do something, will He help us to do it? And here's the thing, I can't. People always like to say that about everything. I can't. I can't. How many, if you have kids, how many times have you heard that from your kids? I can't, you need to do this, I can't, I can't. You know, there are some things that we just can't do on our own. But I can do all things through Christ, amen? And so we can, we can do more than we think we can. A lot of people, they get overwhelmed about the thought of memorizing scripture. I'm too old, I'm too dumb, I'm too whatever. Sometimes they think it's impossible. Others think, well, it's going to take a lot of work. And I don't like work. But work actually is a good thing, isn't it? And seeing the results of work is a good thing. We can memorize phone numbers. Well, we used to do that more. push a button and, you know, or you talk into your phone and you say, hey Siri, call home or whatever. And so we do memorize fewer phone numbers, but we memorize other things. We memorize addresses, we remember words to songs. We shouldn't dread memorizing something that's going to help us and others. And you know, there's a part of us that does dread that. You say, well, that makes absolutely no sense. Why would that be? Why is there part of us that doesn't want to memorize Scripture? Can I tell you which part of you doesn't want to memorize Scripture? It's called the old man. It's corrupt. It's deceitful. Darkness doesn't like light. And if we have a deceitful heart, well, the last thing a deceitful heart wants is truth. Hello. And so we have to combat. the flesh by doing spiritual things and do it in God's way. So the question is then again, will God help me to memorize scripture? And the answer is yes. Obviously, if you can memorize other things, the Lord will help you recall his word. In fact, we even have a promise about his help with the word of God, and that's found in John 14, verse 26. He says this, but the comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, so the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, so Jesus is speaking to his disciples, says, I'm gonna send the Comforter, and the Father's gonna send, he's gonna come in my name. He says, he shall teach you all things, so he'll be our teacher, and here's the next part, and bring all things to your remembrance whatsoever I have said unto you. Now, I like that. It's my job to get some of these things in my head and in my heart. It's his job to bring them to my remembrance. You know, we don't even have to trust our memory. We just have to trust God to help us with our memory. You know, I don't know about you, but there's been times, you know, I've gone soul winning and had opportunities to give the gospel. And there are certain verses that I use most of the time. But then every once in a while, just the needs of one person might not be the exact needs of another person, and the Lord just brings a verse back to my mind that maybe I hadn't used for a while in a soul-winning presentation, but it's what they needed, and just like, he brings it back. I like that. I like that he does it. It doesn't have to be my rote memorization. I've got these five verses, and we're gonna go through this, and if you don't get it, too bad, buddy. It doesn't always work that way, but it's just nice to walk with the Lord and trust Him, and He will bring all things to your remembrance. What a good God we have. Not only does He tell us that we should and to hide His words in our heart, but then He also helps us to be able to pull them back and remember them. So if you put it in your heart, then the Holy Spirit can help you pull it back when it's needed. All right. You see that? Did you see that? We just finished point number three. And it took weeks to do points one and two. And we're going to conquer number four here in just a moment. Number four. So when should I memorize? This is more of a practical thought about when should I memorize. I made a point before in the past that meditation and memorization, they go hand in hand. And really, we can and should meditate on God's Word. We should do that in the morning. We should do that throughout the day. We should do that in the evening. So meditation, so when you meditate, it does lend toward memorization. Memorization doesn't always lend toward meditation. Sometimes people are just trying to get words down. They're cramming, right? You know, students know all about that. They're cramming for a quiz or a test. They have no idea what, they're just pouring it in there and hope the right things come out. And obviously, as a teacher, I know they don't always come out. They'll put the wrong list and the wrong question because all they did was cram and got some information, but never took the time to process that information. It just came out, but it came out in the wrong place. Maybe you should have studied in a little more understanding and comprehension. But anyway, people do that. So you can memorize without meditating, but as you meditate, it will actually help you to memorize. And so with that in mind, consider what the psalmist said about the blessed man in Psalm 1, verse number 2. It says, So the blessed man, his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law doth he meditate, how often? Day and night. night. So if we're going to meditate, and the meditation will help us with the memorization, we meditate in His Word day and night. Can I suggest that maybe practical help would be maybe take a few minutes in your devotions in the morning to meditate, memorize some scripture, and then set some time aside as you are spending some time with the Lord in the evening before you close the day. Certainly, you're reading His Word and praying take a couple more moments and go through maybe some verses that you're doing. You don't have to do it at that time. You could do it after supper. You could do it at supper. Maybe you'll choose family devotions as a time to go through a memory verse, maybe as a family or something like that. I know the church right now is challenging folks to memorize Titus chapter 2, and that's good, but that doesn't have to be the only passage that you memorize. It's good to be challenged to do something because it gets... some to do something that maybe they haven't been doing for a while and to do what they probably should be doing. But just again, just take a few minutes and you can do that, your personal devotions, your family devotions, and review those verses. Later in the day, I'll give you some more thoughts in a moment here. So let's get to point number five. You see how, I mean, we are cruising, except I'm just looking at my time, and we didn't cruise fast enough. So we have point number five. Some tips. These are more practical tips for memorizing scripture. I really had high hopes of getting done, but that clock, I think, threw me off. I am not going to get done. So, I'm going to be nice. I'm going to let you out early today. Let's pray and we'll get ready for our morning service. Thank You, Lord, that we have time to be in Your Word. And Lord, even following Your example, how You increased in wisdom. You spent time growing and learning and studying and communing with your Heavenly Father. Help that to be an encouragement to us to do that. And also, Lord, you had the Scriptures and you fought off temptations. You resisted the devil with the Word of God. And if that's the method you chose, how could we think to improve upon that method, help us to realize that's how we must fight back as well. And we're grateful, Lord Jesus, that there were people who were hurting, and you went through the Scriptures. You rebuked them, but in the end, you encouraged them and helped them, and their hearts were burning, and they had hope. And I pray that We'd be looking for opportunities to help others who are hurting, whether it's the lost or people that we know, Christians, people in our family, just looking for needs, being willing to share your truth and not be so focused on ourselves. And to remember part of why we hide Your Word is to help us to have the walk with You that we should, but it also is so that we can be a help and encouragement to others. Lord, we're so needy, and I just ask that You'll continue to guide us as we look into Your Word. And bless the service that's going to follow, we pray in Christ's name, amen.