52 Lists

One of the blogs I read mentioned a challenge on this site to write 52 lists this year. Ummm, a challenge to write lists? Yes, please! I am a huge fan of lists and list-writing. Sometimes, when I have nothing better to do I just pick a topic and write a whole list about it (I have one going on right now to list all the churches I've been to...I already have more than 50 churches listed, and that's just SDA churches... Yes, I am that nerdy.) So for this challenge, Moorea Seal, the blog writer, posts a topic each Tuesday and for a week you make up a list on that topic. Sounds like fun to me! I'm going to do the challenge. If you are a list-writer, too, take a look at the site and join in!

52 Lists in 2013

Bible Verse 7

A few weeks ago I memorized Philippians 4:19. When I found that verse, I also came across a passage earlier in the chapter that I loosely knew, but realized I wanted to sharpen up on sometime during this year. This past week I found a blog written by a girl I went to college with and her husband. They have recently moved to Peru to work at a home for girls for a year and started this blog to share their journey with others. As I read one of their blog posts, I saw Philippians 4:6 & 7 mentioned, and I took that as a good sign to memorize that verse this week.

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"Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus." ~ Philippians 4:6 & 7 NKJV

I am often anxious about a lot of things, many of them things that don't even really matter in the grand scheme of things. I want the peace of God to take away those worries and leave me with a peaceful and happy heart, one that focuses more on Him than on the cares of this world.

Picked after reading Kyle & Kayleigh's mission blog post from January 31.

Bible Verse 6

The past two weeks I've been memorizing verses about keeping the word of God in my heart and using it as a path to follow throughout my life. This week I want to focus on searching for God within those verses. On Sunday when I read my morning watch story for February 3, I realized that the associated text was the perfect one for me to keep in my mind this week.

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"You will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart." ~ Jeremiah 29:13 NKJV

Searching for God with all my heart should be first and foremost in my life, but sadly it's not always so. This week as I memorize my verse, I want to remember to search for God in the scriptures that I read. What things does he have hiding for me to discover as I continue to search for Him?

Picked from the SDA women's devotional "Blessed: 365 Devotionals for Women by Women" | Reading for February 3

Bible Verse 5

I enjoyed memorizing last week's verse so much that I wanted to do another one similar to it. Memorizing a verse that perfectly outlines the point of a verse-memorizing challenge was pretty powerful to me this week, and each time I said my chosen verse, I remembered the reason I wanted to do this challenge in the first place. I want that same feeling with my verse for this week, so I went to the same chapter as last's week verse and found this one.

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"Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path." ~ Psalm 119:105 KJV

I want God's will for my life to shine through my own desires. I want His word to guide me during this week, for the rest of the year, and throughout my whole life. I want the verses I read and study and memorize to light up the path that God wants me to follow, the path He has chosen especially for me.

Picked from What Christians Want to Know.com and my own searching

Bible Verse 4

This past week I was wondering how to best find really good, meaningful verses to memorize if I can't come up with any on my own. I decided to type 'good verses to memorize' into Google and see what it came up with. The search results found lots of sites to give me some help, and while browsing the top two sites I found more verses than I'll be able to memorize throughout the year. So, on weeks when a verse doesn't just come to me, I'll look at those sites and find a verse to memorize. That's how I found my fourth verse.

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"Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee." ~ Psalm 119:11 KJV

I love this verse, especially in the context of 52 Weeks 52 Verses, because that's the essence of why I'm doing this challenge. I want to hide God's word in my heart so I can recall the verses I need to remember when I'm in trying circumstances. So that instead of looking verses up in my Bible or relying on tools like concordances or online Bibles I can recall them straight from my heart. And, most importantly, so that I can grow closer to God each day!

Picked from What Christians Want to Know.com

Bible Verse 3

This past week was a 'down' week for me. I didn't do very well at keeping up with studying the lesson quarterly and therefore never found a verse to memorize from the lesson. But God was good and threw a verse into my lap on Sabbath during the Sabbath School lesson study time. Somehow, throughout the discussion about the end of the creation week, the topic of God giving us what we need came up and someone in the class read a verse from Philippians 4. I liked the verse and continued reading on in the chapter as most everyone else in the class shut their Bibles and the discussion continued. And then I arrived at Philippians 4:19 and, yes, again I already know this verse, but it just struck me as one I need to focus on and think about more in my day to day life. So it's become my verse for week 3.

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"And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus." ~ Philippians 4:19 NKJV

The past few weeks Jonathan and I have been looking around the Bangor area (and the internet) searching for some more storage space for our apartment. Our kitchen, with just one small wall of base and wall cabinets, most desperately needs storage space. After looking on countless websites and visiting numerous stores, we thought we'd found the answer in a large pantry cabinet from Lowe's. However, upon bringing it home, lugging the heavy package up the snowy outside stairs to our apartment, and opening the box, we found that the cabinet was quite flimsy with just a thin back and would need to be screwed to the walls. Not quite what we had expected and not something we wanted to do to a kitchen that isn't ours. So we packed it all back up in the box and returned it a couple days later. We still don't have what we need for our kitchen, but today we cleaned up the back bedroom (currently our storage area) and managed to fit most of the canned and bulk food into a cabinet that was left in there when the previous renters moved out. It's not the perfect solution, we're still looking for something better, but it works, and I have no doubt that God will give us what a better solution right when we need it most.

Found during the Youth/Collegiate Sabbath School class at Bangor SDA Church | Saturday, January 19, 2013

Bible Verse 2

"For it is the God who commands light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." ~ 2 Corinthians 4:6 NKJV

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As I was reading through the Sabbath School lesson for the second week of January, I looked up this verse and was struck by the words. These simply put, but powerful words plunged straight from my Bible's pages into my heart. That the God of the universe, the One who can command light to shine wherever he wants it, can also shine straight into my heart is amazing! Even with all the cloudy weather we've been having here in this part of Maine this week, this text stuck with me and gave me sunshine in my soul.

Picked from the SDA Sabbath School Quarterly | Lesson 2: Creation: Forming the World | Thursday, January 10

Bible Verse 1

52 Verses in 52 Weeks. My mum and my grandparents did it last year, and I'll be joining them this year.

Last night I wrote about my New Year's Resolutions, and as I wrote, I realized that with such a huge list the only way I can keep myself accountable is to document my resolutions here. Maybe not all of them, but some of them. And this is one I can document on my blog. So this year I will be writing 52 blog posts about the verses I memorize each week. I know that because my thoughts about resolutions for 2013 hadn't jelled yet when the year began I'll have to play a bit of catch up. So, this week I will memorize two verses, next week two more, and then one a week for the rest of the year.

I want to mention that if you feel so inclined, you're more than welcome to join me as I memorize 52 verses this year. You don't have to document your Bible verses on your blog or on Facebook or anywhere online. You can document them in a notebook or even just document them in your heart and mind. But if you want to join me, and you want to share the verses you choose in an online venue, I would really enjoy the partnership and encouragement, the sharing and learning that it could foster. If you decide to do this challenge with me, please let me know so we can be in this together.

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"Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible." ~ Hebrews 11:1 & 3 NKJV

I have long known Hebrews 11:1, if not completely by memory than at least by near-memory from hearing it many times over, being quoted or in scripture readings and sermons. But Hebrews 11:3, only two verses later, is not one we hear so often. I spotted it during my study of the first lesson of this year, looked it up in my Bible, and lingered over the words, reading verse 1 then jumping to verse 3 and back again and seeing how beautifully they fit together. How often do I miss precious verses by just a few sentences? I fear it happens all too frequently. I hope that throughout this year God will lead me to some of those verses. The beautiful, powerful ones that are sometimes buried just a little deeper than I usually think to dig.

Picked from the SDA Sabbath School Quarterly | Lesson 1: Jesus, Creator of Heaven and Earth | Sunday, December 30

52 Weeks 52 Verses

My mum found a neat challenge through a friend of a friend's blog, 52 Weeks 52 Verses. She decided to do the challenge and now she is learning a new Bible verse by memory for every week of this year. By the end of the year she'll have 52 new verses memorized! I think that's pretty neat.

She only found the challenge a week or so into the new year so she didn't start right at the start of 2012, but she's making great progress. For her first verse she chose Proverbs 15:1. The next week she picked 2 Corinthians 9:15. (Also, check out some pictures of me she included in that post to celebrate my birthday!) And on her third week she memorized Jeremiah 29:12-13.

To keep up with her memorizing challenge, follow her blog. I already am. Join me and let's see what other wise verses she chooses to memorize in 2012!