Memory Monday — Deuteronomy 6:4-8 (Phylacteries)

I seem to be going for the every other week theme right now. Not necessarily a good thing.

From memory:

Deuteronomy 6:4-8
Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.

This was supposed to include verse 9, but when I sat down to type it out I went blank. Not quite completely. I knew the verse had to do with doorposts (it was doorframes) and gates, but the actual verse was completely gone from my mind. So I get to do it again next week with verse 9.

Verse 8 got me thinking a little bit, because I always focused on verse 9, the one I couldn't remember, and the commandments of the Lord being there as you walk out to remind you before you face the world. But binding them on your forehead — exactly how was that supposed to work?

First I used John MacArthur's Bible Commentary (the one for the entire Bible) and looked up these verses. He said that that the Israelites were to continually meditate on and be led by God's commandments, but that later in Jewish history that this phrase was mistakenly taken literally and that the people tied phylacteries to their hands and foreheads with leather straps. These phylacteries are little boxes containing these verses, and are also called tefillin, or putting on teffillin (thanks, Wikipedia).

When I looked up phylacteries on the internet and found some information on various sites, including Wikipedia, there were a few pictures, which was really what I was interested in. Because I'm curious that way and wanted to know what it looked like to wear it on your forehead. Here are what the phylacteries look like

and here is what they look like being worn, on the forehead and on the arm.

There were rules and such about wearing them, and I'm also curious enough to find it interesting to read about that stuff. If you are, you can just google phylacteries.

For more Memory Monday stuff, join Joanne at The Simple Wife.

Memory Monday

Yes, I know it's Tuesday, but I refuse to skip this week.

From memory:

Deuteronomy 6:4-7
Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be written upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up.

By next Monday I hope to have this passage through verse 9 completed, and without any mistakes.

Visit Joanne at The Simple Wife for Memory Monday.

Memory Monday — Plus Some Weather

I missed last week. Just thought I'd confess. Guilty conscience.

From memory:

Deuteronomy 6:4-5
"Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind strength."

I do that every time! I don't know when I will ever learn.

Next week I will add at least verse 6 and maybe more, eventually going through verse 9. I will type out the entire passage I have memorized each time until it's done. Hey, maybe it will be next week!

On another note, if you've been watching the NCAA tournament, and you happen to watch tonight, they might mention our weather here in the Detroit area. Here is a little glimpse from outside my van window before I went to the grocery store this morning.

We only got three inches, which was less than some areas. It was probably the heaviest, wettest snow I've ever experienced. And with it barely hovering above freezing all day, the only thing clear is the road right now.

Memory Monday

I dug out some of my colored unlined 3 x 5 index cards, picked yellow since they seemed to be the ones not used for anything else, hole punched the corner in a little so it wouldn't tear easily, and then used a ring binder to hold them together. I put this week's verse on top.

It can go anywhere with me now, I can add verses week by week, and it makes reviewing previous weeks super easy. I don't want to memorize verses and passages and then forget them, so I'd like to review every so often. I'm going to go back this week and add the verses I've done in prior weeks, plus adding the ones for the upcoming week(s). It's a passage, and I will put each verse on a card by itself so I can learn one verse at a time. I'd rather do one or two than none.

So for this week, from memory:

Psalm 119:9
How can a young man keep his way pure?
By living according to your word.

I picked that verse following the Proverbs I memorized from chapter 4, verses 20-27. For next week I will start working on Deuteronomy 6:4-9.

You can click on the Memory Monday link at the top to go to The Simple Wife.

Memory Monday — Proverbs 4:20-27

I've missed something like four weeks of Memory Monday, shame on me! I've even been getting my menu plans posted on Sundays specifically to free up Monday for this, but I just haven't had my verses memorized. After this I'm going to have to stop biting off more than I can chew and plan for fewer verses a week for a little while, maybe even just one. Then if that's going really well I'll add more as a bonus. I'd rather do that than completely skip.

So, from memory:

Proverbs 4:20-27:
20 My son, pay attention to what I say;
listen closely to my words.
21 Do not let them out of your sight,
keep them close to within your heart;
22 for they are life to those who find them
and health to a man's whole body.
23 Above all else, guard your heart,
for it is the wellspring of life.
24 Put away perversity from your mouth;
keep corrupt talk far from your lips.
25 Let your eyes look straight ahead,
fix your gaze directly before you.
26 Make level paths for your feet
and take only ways that are firm.
27 Do not swerve to the right or to the left;
keep your foot from evil.

I had said before that we had the last five verses, 23 through 27, each listed on a different colored index card and hanging on our kids' bathroom mirror in Virginia. I did this for several reasons, but primarily as a reminder to them of how important it was to guard their hearts.

I got the verses specifically after reading The Squire and the Scroll by Jennie Bishop. It's a book that follows along with The Princess and the Kiss for girls. The Squire and the Scroll is 'A Tale of the Rewards of a Pure Heart' and follows the squire on his quest to save the Lantern of Purest Light after the kingdom's final and most trusted knight, and the squire's master, fell to temptation.

There are a lot of temptations out there for our kids these days, as well as us, and these verses can be the cornerstone to battling those temptations. I was going to challenge my kids to memorize them and post their own Memory Monday, but we didn't get around to it. I'm hoping to get that done soon. They've seen these verses, but they don't have them memorized, and I think that's very important.

For next week I'll be memorizing Psalm 119:9, which goes along perfectly with these verses:

How can a young man keep his way pure? By living according to your word.

After that I will move to Deuteronomy 6:4-9, just getting as much as I can done at a time. I'm going to put them on index cards, hole punch the corners, and put them on a ring binder. Then I can carry them around the house with me or throw them in my purse, or just whatever. That's been my downfall — not having them handy all the time. I think that will help me get them memorized more effectively.

Joanne hosts Memory Monday at The Simple Wife every week.

Memory Monday — Proverbs 4:23-27, Individually

These verses were each on a colored index card and then hung from the kids' bathroom mirror in Virginia. We have yet to find a great place for them here in Michigan since they no longer all share a bathroom.

Each card, except the one with the first verse, had a little note on the bottom to help them with the big words or with a little more application. That's what I'm going to share this week.

From memory:

Proverbs 4:23
Above all things else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life.

Proverbs 4:24
Put away perversity from your mouth; keep corrupt talk far from your lips.
*perversity means really bad stuff (and I had a frowning face drawn next to that)
*corrupt talk means bad words and things that hurt people's feelings

Proverbs 4:25
Let your eyes look straight ahead, fix your gaze directly before you.
This means keep your eyes on the Lord and what is right, so sometimes we have to look at our shoes in public.

Proverbs 4:26
Make level paths for your feet and walk take only ways that are firm.
Don't go somewhere you shouldn't and where you might be tempted to do wrong.

Proverbs 4:27
Do not swerve to the right or the left; keep your feet foot from evil.
Satan is the curb we bump up on that keeps us from pleasing God. The curbs are things that tempt us to turn down another road even though we know we are on the right one.

I'm getting this posted much later than I wanted to, so I didn't get to go into much detail on the shoes thing. I also made a few mistakes in my verses, and being the perfectionist I am, I think I will get them right for next week, plus add verses 20-22 to the beginning. I love Deuteronomy 6:4-9, although realistically I don't think I can memorize those by next Monday also. I do think they really go hand in hand with these verses from Proverbs though. So I plan to memorize those by the next Monday. Maybe I will be able to at least get a head start on them.

I'm also going to challenge my children to memorize these five verses from Proverbs, and then they can post for Memory Monday next week too. Then I wouldn't have to find a place to put these cards up right away either.

Joanne hosts Memory Monday over at The Simple Wife every week. Have a blessed week!

Memory Monday — Pigs and Pearls

From memory:

Matthew 7:1-6
"Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.
"Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.
"Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and then turn and tear you to pieces.

I got it all right this week. Last week I did verses 1 through 5, and I left out three words. I corrected it before I posted, putting the words in a different color. I selected a nice darker red shade, and then after I posted I realized it was the same exact color my words always show up in the text. I was too lazy to go back and fix it, so I'm confessing it here. I left out three words last week. And if you haven't read what I had to say about pigs, pearls, and such, and you're interested, you can go take a look at that post here.

Next week, prudes. As in we are at our house, not that I went piddling in my concordance and found it listed.

My verses for next week:
Proverbs 4:23
Proverbs 4:24
Proverbs 4:25
Proverbs 4:26
Proverbs 4:27
I listed them individually instead of as a group because that's how I will be memorizing them and explaining their meaning to our family.

I love the accountablility Memory Monday provides me. You can read more about it at The Simple Wife.

Memory Monday — It Started With A Pig

From memory:

Matthew 7:1-5
"Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.
"Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.

Here is verse 6 that I will have to add on for next week. I just didn't get the whole thing memorized.
"Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and then turn and tear you to pieces."

As I said two weeks ago, I picked this passage when I was piddling around in my Bible concordance and saw a verse listed under pig. My initial thought was that it was the primary verse associated with a Bible study I purchased a while back to do with my girls called "Beauty and the Pig; A Study of Godly Beauty," because while looking at the verse it did talk about throwing your pearls to the pigs.

Two things here...I never remember associating this particular verse with this particular passage about not judging others. Ever. And although this verse is listed, along with many other pig and swine verses, in the Bible study, it was not the primary verse. Just for the record, the primary verse was Proverbs 11:22. The NIV reads, "Like a gold ring in a pig's snout is a beautiful woman who shows no discretion." A little poetic, but even I get that.

So I also did some extra study these last two weeks on the Matthew passage and pigs, in the Biblical sense. There's not a lot to say about the pig, or swine, except that it is considered the picture of uncleanliness. Filthy might be a better word. Dogs in this passage were much the same since they were not domesticated as house pets and were usually scavenging, wild animals that would turn on you if you got between them and something they wanted.

This part of Jesus' sermon was focusing on the scribes and Pharisees and the human standards they had set. A little later on in the chapter it even goes on to warn about false prophets (v15). Jesus was not saying that we were not to oppose or correct wrong, as long as we are looking at it based on Biblical doctrine. Otherwise how would we be able to determine the dogs and the swine? John MacArthur said it much better than I could ever dream of saying it:

"There will be times when the gospel we present is absolutely rejected and ridiculed and we make the judgment to turn away and speak no more, deciding that we should "shake off the dust of [our] feet" (Matt. 10:14) and begin ministering somewhere else. There will be times when those to whom we witness will resist the gospel and blaspheme God, and we may speak words of judgment...When people not only reject the gospel, but insist on mocking and reviling it, we are not to waste God's holy Word and the precious pearls of His truth in a futile and frustrating attempt to win them. We are to leave them to the Lord, trusting that somehow His Spirit can pentrate their hearts..."

I will finish memorizing this Matthew passage for next week. I have high hopes to memorize a few other verses also. If I do, I'll share them and their meaning, and if not, they'll be for the next week.

Joanne hosts Memory Monday over at her place, The Simple Wife. Go check it out.

Memory Monday — Psalm 1:1-6

It feels like forever since I participated in Memory Monday. The last time I had learned the first half of Psalm 1:1-6 and planned to have it done by the next week. Well, Christmas, company, and my plans went awry. I had even wanted to do the Christmas story from Luke before Christmas. Considering it's January, that obviously didn't happen. At least I can prior plan that one for next year!

From memory:

Psalm 1:1-6
Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked
or stand in the way of sinners
or sit in the seat of mockers.
But his delight is in the law of the Lord,
and on his law he meditates day and night.
He is like a tree planted by streams of water,
which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither.
Whatever he does prospers.
Not so the wicked!
They are like chaff that the wind blows away.
Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment,
nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous.
For the Lord watches over the way of the righteous,
but the way of the wicked will perish.

I picked this because I'm not normally a Psalm girl, but when I was polishing up Psalm 4:4 I glanced over and saw this and thought it was good. I'm too left brain to like poetry — I just don't get it. I have to read the kid version of Shakespeare that's been written in story form just to get it very well. When I read Job this last time, I read it in The Message which made it much more understandable for me. So the Psalms kind of fall into this category and if I'm reading through the book I will pick up The Message also. Strange I would pick an entire passage for memorization from there.

I also found a helpful way to solidfy the verses. Instead of just memorizing like I normally would, looking at it and saying it while looking away, I studied it and then practiced writing it down on paper over and over again, adding more and more, or doing it by sections and then putting it all together. That really helped me, especially with remembering where the punctuation went.

For next time I think I'm going to start working on Matthew 7:1-6. I'd like to use it with my kids, and my girls have a kit that I think is based on verse six. When I was looking in my concordance I saw "pigs" and then had to take a look. I honestly didn't remember that the pig verse was part of that particular passage, so I decided to tackle the whole thing. I'd like to try and do some additional study on it as well.

Go visit Joanne at The Simple Wife if you'd like to participate.

Memory Monday

From memory:

Psalm 1:1-3
"Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked
or stand in the way of sinners
or sit in the seat of mockers.
But his delight is in the law of the Lord,
and on his law he meditates day and night.
He is like a tree planted by streams of water,
which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither.
Whatever he does prospers."

My goal was the entire chapter of Psalm 1 and I only got through half of it. I could give you all the reasons why but I'll just show you a few pictures that might help explain it.

Saturday morning's forecast called for about an inch of accumulation. Let's just say that Hubby couldn't keep the snow off the driveway or sidewalk, and there was more than enough for the kids to play in later in the afternoon. This was the truck from Virginia. These three men didn't know what hit them. They didn't look at The Weather Channel before they left and weren't really prepared. This truck had the 4,000 pounds of things that the military moved and stored for us, which was mostly our heaviest furniture, front porch/shed type items, and about 15 boxes.

Last week also brought our girls' 15th birthday, and I am so tardy in posting their birth story! I am going to do it tomorrow. I might have to make it a two-day story because I think it will probably get lengthy. Then when I'm done with it I will post some house pictures — actually inside! We still need to get our tree up, and Buddy's best friend and his mom are coming in from Virginia on Friday. I'm a little overwhelmed.

For next week's Memory Monday I will finish up with Psalm 1. I love Joanne's idea of memorizing the Christmas story from Luke. We used to read/quote it on Christmas at my grandparents' house before opening gifts in the afternoon. I am pretty sure it was in the KJV though. I don't have it completely memorized, so maybe after Psalm 1 I'll move on to it, but it will probably be the only thing I don't do in NIV.

Memory Monday

Sadly, I've missed the last couple of weeks. The big move took priority and I didn't have any time to get on the computer. I had my verse memorized for last week and was lazy and didn't do another one. With Thanksgiving, and knowing I had lots of unpacking and furniture assembly on my plate, I decided that I would just work on keeping that one and the first one I learned solidified in my brain. So here is my newest one, from memory:

Psalm 4:4
"In your anger do not sin;
when you are on your beds,
search your hearts and be silent."

I've known the first part of this verse for years and used it with my children. Letting them know it was okay to be angry was important; letting them know it was important how they handled it was even more important. Something brought me to look at this verse and I happened to read the rest of it, and that's when I realized there were a lot of truths to be found there. There are times when I must send my children to their rooms to think about what they have done, how their attitudes are affecting either themselves or others in the household, and while they are in their rooms, the second part of that verse is so meaningful and wise. I thought it was an important verse for me to memorize in the training of my children, not that it will hurt me in the least either, and I want to pass it on to them now and have them memorize it. I think if they can come up with it as second nature like they do some of their Awana verses, it will have a real impact on how quickly attitudes turn around.

For this next week I am going to be terribly ambitious. Honestly, I've always been great at memorization. For the short-term. I could always memorize something for a test in a subject I didn't care about and then just trash the information like I never knew it. But this is obviously very different. So for next week I'm going to memorize Psalm 1. The whole thing. Feel free to pray for me. I will probably need it.

To join in Memory Monday or see how absolutely wonderful Joanne is doing, go visit her over at The Simple Wife.

Memory Monday

Joanne Heim at The Simple Wife has started something new, Memory Monday. She is the author of the book Living Simply, an absolute gem. I am leisurely reading through it, treasuring each minute even though I will probably re-read it as soon as I am finished, all the while whipping through fiction after fiction after fiction. I refuse to read this book when I am drifting off to sleep because I don't want to miss a thing! (Just as a little side note: being a math brain, I don't do so well with reading comprehension unless I read something a second time...then it seems to sink in a little more permanently.)

So about Memory Monday — Joanne started this to provide accountability and motivation for herself in memorizing God's word and writing it on her heart, and she's invited us along. Each Monday we will type our verse or passage out by memory that we've memorized in the past week. I'm so fantastic at paraphrasing and knowing the content of a verse, but not the actual word-for-word verse or the specific scripture reference. I freely use my concordance or my husband to find verses, not always in that order. I'm reminded that there are countries in this world that are not allowed to have Bibles for fear of persecution, or don't have enough for everyone to have one. They will cut one up and share it, carrying that paper around, treasuring it and memorizing it, until trading it for a different one. Those people know what it means to hide God's word in their heart. I am spoiled by convenience. I, too, have been convicted recently about this same thing, and I am so privileged to participate in Memory Monday.

The verse I picked for this week is one of my favorites, and when I learned it at the beginning of the century (isn't is so much fun to say that?) I learned it in a different version than the one I'm going to share here (all mine will be NIV here), then got it mixed up with another one soon after (probably NIV at that point), and another version confused me sometime later. And for some reason I could never remember exactly what verse number it was: five or eight. So I decided it was a good one for me to start with. Being a perfectionist, I even tried to remember where the punctuation was, but that's where I might get it goofed up. By memory:

Philippians 4:8
"Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things."

If you want to read Joanne's explanation about Memory Monday, you can go here, and she has a button you can pick up if you want to participate. And to see what Joanne and others memorized this week, here's the link for that. While you're there, look around her blog. I think you'll be glad you did.