SSMT 2017: Verse 1!

Hey, Everybody! Drumroll please! Welcome to the 2017 Siesta Scripture Memory Team! The entry of your Verse 1 selection acts as your registration. Please read this brief post before you leave your comment so you’ll know exactly how to do it. We are not legalisticĀ about much around here but I am a drill sergeant about the precise way we accept comments for SSMT verse entries. OneĀ perusal through the first several hundred comments and you’ll understand why. It’s such a powerful sight you will almost want to cry. Or shout. Or throw your head back and howl your loudest hallelujah. It just all depends on how you process a fresh glimpse of divine revelation. You’ll have before you a feast spread out lavishly on a huge banqueting table. Ā Keeping the comments to the bare minimum makes Scripture itself stand out on the page. If we add a lot of other verbiage to the comment, the verse is more likely to get lost in it.

Not only will your soul be fed by the entries of others, you’ll discover verses you didn’t even know existed and get ideas for future selections. Any time you can’t decide what verse to memorize, jump on the comments and see what resonates with you. Any time you feel bone-dry or downcast or distracted or discouraged or just plain directionless, open up the comments on any SSMT post and behold the words of the Lord. It’s so powerful I could slap my desk thinking about it.

OK, this is how the information should appear in your comment:

Name (first is fine), city: verse, reference, Bible translation.

(Don’t forget your translation! People love knowing exactly which translation your selection came from.)

So you’ll have a paradigm for how itĀ looks, here is my entry for Verse 1 and you’ll see at the end of the post where I made a slight little addition to add some soul-deep conviction if you wish:

Beth Moore from Houston Texas: “Paul, a prisoner for Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother, to Philemon our beloved fellow worker.” Philemon 1 ESV

You get to choose your own verse according to what you need most right now, what resonates with you in your present circumstances or what God just simply seems to land you on. This year I feel like He’s leading me to use my 24 entries to memorize the one-chapter book of Philemon. It contains 25 verses but the last one is easy so I’ll throw it in with my 24th verse as my final entry. I’ve done stacks of spirals full of unrelated Scriptures for my memory work in previous years. Other times I’ve done several different chunks or one solid chapter. There is no wrong way to do it. It just all depends on what the Holy Spirit seems to be energizing us to do. If something about chipping away at one chapter through the course of the year rings your bell, you are so welcome to join me or you can look through the Scriptures and choose a different chapter of similar length. I so loved memorizing Psalm 25 several years ago. I recited it as recently as yesterday. It has 22 verses ready to go if you’d like to consider it. You’d only need to tag on 2 separate verses after you memorized the psalm to fulfill your 24-verse goal. Jude is another one-chapter book I memorized. It contains 25 verses but I will warn you in advance, take that one on only if you like a challenge. It is pretty wordy.

Let’s just add two little wordsĀ this time toĀ the front of theĀ entry of our first verse: I commit! And go right ahead and add that exclamation mark at the end of it for the sake of some very appropriate enthusiasm. What you’re about to do bears FRUIT. God’s Word does not return empty. He sends it forth with accomplishing power and divine purpose. That’s worth anticipating with excitement. (In fact, Isaiah 55:11 is a fabulous Scripture to memorize if you’re still searching for a great launch verse.) I think we ought to add those two little words becauseĀ I keep reading how allergic we’re growing culturally to making commitments of almost any kind. I’m sure you’ve read the same thing. But here’s the deal. We will never be mighty servants of Jesus Christ, alive and awake in the Holy Spirit, bringing glory to God the Father all while standing againstĀ evil rulers, powers and principalitiesĀ without commitment.

Ain’t happenin’.

Nothing was tentative to those early New Testament believers about following Jesus. They didn’t fulfill their callings by being scared of commitment. They gave Him their lives. They bore His name. They testified to the death. Let’s do this thing, Sisters. Let’s do it deliberately. We’re not destined to be weak-willed women. We’re called to be stunningly strong willed about God’s will. So, here’s my official entry for verse 1 of the Siesta Scripture Memory Team challenge of 2017!

I commit! Beth Moore from Houston Texas: “Paul, a prisoner for Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother, to Philemon our beloved fellow worker.” Philemon 1 ESV

Your turn, sisters! Try to make each of your entries within 24-48 hours after the posts go up around the 1st and the 15th of each month. Also remember not to worry if you don’t see your comment posted for a day or so. Wait a while before you post the same verse a second time. We moderate all comments to filter through spam and trash and general nastiness so the process can take a little time. Here we go! I’m beside myself with joy. Thank you for the privilege to store up the very words of God with you. They are life and breath to us. Iron in our blood. Steel in our bones. So much love to you.

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5,413 Responses to “SSMT 2017: Verse 1!”

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Comments:

  1. 5201
    Sarai says:

    Brooklyn, New York: ” I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that people will fear Him”. Ecclesiastes 3:14 (NIV)

  2. 5202
    Tori says:

    Tori in Elmer, La
    Be alert, stand firm in the faith, be strong. Your every action must be done with love.
    1 Corinthians 16:13-14

  3. 5203
    Tori says:

    Tori in Elmer Louisiana
    I will lead the blind by a way they did not know; I will guide them on paths they have not known.
    I will turn darkness to light in front of them and rough places into level ground. This is what I will do for them, and I will not forsake them. Isaiah 42:16 HCSB

  4. 5204
    Karen Russell says:

    Yakima WA I COMMIT: PSALM 9:1-2 GOD’S WORD TRANSLATION
    1 ā€œI will give You thanks, O Lord, with all my heart. I will tell about all the miracles You have done.
    2 I will find joy and be glad about You. I will make music to praise Your Name, O Most High.”

    The recent miracle: God has healed my brother of Stage 3 Cancer. Praise His Name forever!

  5. 5205
    Jen Redcay says:

    Verse #23 an #24
    “And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christian forgave you.” Eph. 4:32 nkjv
    “Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnared us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us.” Heb.12:1 nkjv

  6. 5206
    Sarai says:

    July 1 replacement as did a repeat.”We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making His appeal through us. We implore you on God’s behalf; Be reconciled to God”. II Corinthians 5:20 (NIV)

  7. 5207
    Sarai says:

    Brooklyn, New York: “Now finish the work, so that your eager willingness to do it may be matched by your completion of it, according to your means”. II Corinthians 8:11(NIV)

  8. 5208
    Stacie M. Gerathy says:

    Stacie M. Gerathy from Livonia, MI
    Philemon 1:1 ESV To Philemon our beloved fellow worker and Apphia our sister and Archippus our fellow soldier, and the church in your house

  9. 5209
    Janet Waid says:

    Psalm 19:12-13 NIV “Who can discern his errors? Forgive my hidden faults. Keep Your servant also from willful sins; may they not rule over me. Then will I be blameless, innocent of great transgression.”

  10. 5210
    Lois Lorentzen says:

    John 16:33
    ā€œI have told you these things to give you peace. In this world you will have troubles, but take heart, I have overcome the world!ā€

  11. 5211
    Christina says:

    I commit! Christina from Winter Haven, FL

    Psalms 23:1 NKJV

    “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.”

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