Memorizing John

Hi, everyone!  I hope you are all doing well today!

Now that VBS is over, I’m trying to check the things off my mental checklist that I had been saving till later.

One of those is this competition with my teens to memorize the book of John.

I can hear many of you sighing, and some of you are saying to yourself, “I can’t do that.”

I said that to myself, too, for YEARS!

And then my son decided to memorize the book of Proverbs, and his youth leader introduced him to a VERY helpful website that explained that it is much more effective to recall a passage than to repeat it over and over and over and over….

Here’s the link to that website for those of you who would like to check it out.

So, here’s a picture of the index cards that I’ve written out to help me recall.

Jbwoh = John bore witness of him

TwhowIs, Htcamipbmpbm: fhwbm. = “This was he of whom I spake, He that cometh after me is preferred before me: for he was before me.”

And so on!

It’s amazing how quickly you can recall a whole verse or bunch of verses, just by reading over them enough to familiarize yourself with them, then trying to recall the words with only the first letter of each word!

I’m sure my son can learn them faster than me, IF he applies himself. Therein lies the catch! So far, he is ahead of me, but we shall see…! 😊

Anyway, I haven’t read much in KJV for a long time, and things are jumping out at me because the wording is different, in addition to the fact that God’s word is alive! Hebrews 4:12

Like verse 15: “This was he of whom I spake, He that cometh after me is preferred before me: for he was before me.” (And this phrase is repeated in verse 30, and part of it is repeated in verse 27. Sure sign God is trying to get our attention!)

So, if we go back to the Christmas story (Luke 1,2), we see that John was born before Jesus. He is somewhere between 5 and 6 months older.

Hence, the wording, “cometh (or comes) after me.”

But the apostle John writes his epistle to prove that Jesus is who He said He is, the Son of God, and therefore God Himself.  If you don’t believe that, I challenge you to join us on this journey to memorize the book of John.

In verses 15 and 30, the apostle John records John the Baptist saying that Jesus CAME after him but WAS before him.

And in verse 27 he states, ” He it is, who coming after me is preferred before me, whose shoe latchet I am not worthy to unloose.” This shows his recognition of his lowly, humble estate of unworthy servant to the very Son of God, even though he and Jesus, in His humanity, are cousins.

Mind blown!

There is so much more, but this is already long enough!

Who will join me on this journey to memorize the book of John? Any takers? Or perhaps you would prefer to read it several times and then study it word by word, phrase by phrase?

May the Lord lead you and guide you and give you peace and joy in knowing Him.