Filling Your Head with What?
As weak as you claim your brain to be, it is still amazing. If you are studying Economics you can pack it full of economic indicators such as unemployment rates, GDP, GNP, CPI, etc. If you’re into hockey that old brain will retain the stats for the top player, their goals and assists for the year, how your team ranks in the NHL Conference Standings, etc. If you happen to be into Southern Gospel music, you’ll know the names of the different groups, who sings what in each group, and you’ll probably know their top songs as well.
How’s your brain when it comes to the Scriptures? Have you ever wondered what it would be like to have your mind saturated with the Word of God? Perhaps you know someone who always seems to have a Bible verse on the tip of their tongue to punctuate conversations or to illuminate discussions by quoting the Scriptures. It’s amazing, isn’t it! But they got it easy! One night they pressed a button and with their wireless connection, they downloaded the Scriptures on to their cerebral hard-drive while they slept. The next day – the verses were just there on the tip of their tongue.
Wishful thinking but fanciful and far-fetched!
We don’t know very much about Eunice. One thing we do know is that she valued the Word of God. As a good mother she packed her son’s head full of Bible verses. Reading the Bible to the little fellow was a major priority in their home. Even grandma Lois probably spent time drilling the Scriptures into Timothy’s head, desiring to have it take root in his heart. Paul reminded Timothy in this verse:
And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures,
which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.
(2Timothy 3:15)
The meaning of ‘child’ in that verse is ‘infancy’ or ‘from the cradle’ – right from the beginning, they poured the Word of God into Timothy.
As morals continue their downward spiral, are we putting extra effort into filling our minds with the Word of God? As a parent observing societal trends, are you compensating by actually increasing your child’s intake of the Word of God – over and above the expected norm?
Am I being a responsible parent? I have eyes to see what it’s like out there and how conditions are deteriorating. Am I making sure the home environment is even more focused on the Word of God than it was when I was growing up? There is something far more important than how or where our children receive their academic instruction and that is what they see in our home and the measure of our own reality. What do they see practiced at home when it comes to Christian behaviour, our priorities, our values, our love for God and for His Word, our love for other Christians and for perishing souls?
As a Sunday School teacher are your students methodically memorizing all the key Bible verses that are “able to make them wise unto salvation through faith in Christ Jesus?” Long before they learn the Fruit of the Spirit or the Beatitudes, they should have on the tip of their tongues the 150+ Gospel verses in the New Testament – not to mention the clear verses from the Old Testament as well.
Finally, how are you doing at committing verses to memory? When have you last memorized a verse? Wouldn’t it be a healthy practice to jot down on a card just one verse from our daily reading each day and to commit it to memory over the course of the day! Let’s be more conscious of what we are storing in our heads and treasuring in our hearts.