Michael Frost - Hide This in Your Heart: Memorizing Scripture for Kingdom Impact

Shortly after coming to faith, I was introduced to Scripture memory through The Navigators Topical Memory System. This launched me on a passionate pursuit to continuously hide Gods Word in my heart. Years later, I heard Michael Frost expound on the BELLS habits for living on mission (explained in his book Surprise the World). I love that Hide This in Your Heart combines the life-altering missional engagement of BELLS with the equally life-changing power of Scripture memory. Those who combine the discipline of Scripture memory with the practice of radically loving people will be deeply blessedand will become a profound blessing to the people in their world.

AL ENGLER, mission director, The Navigators

What a timely book for us, as followers of Jesus, in this current landscape. So often memorizing Scripture and getting on mission are seen as opposed disciplines. However, the longer I join God at work and follow in his Sons footsteps, the more I realize that I need good rhythms in my life and that my own disciplines of prayer and reading are tied up in my understanding of God and his Kingdom. This book is a fantastic practical read for anyone wanting to grow healthy rhythms and fall in love with Scripture in fresh ways. I highly recommend it from two friends and colleagues whose lives have been lived out in these pages.

KIM HAMMOND, lead pastor, CityLife Church in Casey, Australia; coauthor of Sentness: Six Postures of Missional Christians

What a wonderful pairing of Frost and Hill, showing us how to ground our lives in the meditations, mantras, and truths of the Bible. To memorize Scripture is to be formed by the wisdom of God in Christ for the love of the world. This book is an essential guide for our time.

CHRISTIANA RICE, codirector, Parish Collective; coauthor of To Alter Your World: Partnering with God to Rebirth Our Communities

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Hide This in Your Heart: Memorizing Scripture for Kingdom Impact

Copyright 2020 by Michael Frost and Graham Hill. All rights reserved.

A NavPress resource published in alliance with Tyndale House Publishers

NAVPRESS and the NavPress logo are registered trademarks of NavPress, The Navigators, Colorado Springs, CO. TYNDALE is a registered trademark of Tyndale House Ministries. Absence of in connection with marks of NavPress or other parties does not indicate an absence of registration of those marks.

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Cover photograph of folded paper copyright Katsumi Murouchi/Getty Images. All rights reserved. Origami heart by Elijah Chen, photograph copyright Tyndale House Publishers. All rights reserved.

All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version, NIV. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. Scripture quotations marked ESV are from The ESV Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version), copyright 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked MSG are taken from THE MESSAGE, copyright 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. Used by permission of NavPress. All rights reserved. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers. Scripture quotations marked NLT are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Some of the anecdotal illustrations in this book are true to life and are included with the permission of the persons involved. All other illustrations are composites of real situations, and any resemblance to people living or dead is purely coincidental.

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ISBN 978-1-64158-204-9

Build: 2021-04-21 15:11:18 EPUB 3.0

How Memorizing the Bible Empowers Us for Discipleship and Mission

There is no standing still. Every gift, every increment of knowledge and insight I receive only drives me deeper into the word of God.... God has given us the Scripture, from which we are to discern Gods will. The Scripture wants to be read and thought about, every day afresh.

DIETRICH BONHOEFFER

In 2018, Baeble Music released its list of the top karaoke songs of all time. You dont have to particularly like any of these songs or even have been born in the era when they were hits to have some of the lyrics of every one of these songs buried in your brain somewhere. From the list:

1. Mr. BrightsideThe Killers
2. You Oughta KnowAlanis Morissette
3. I Will Always Love YouWhitney Houston
4. Dont Stop BelievinJourney
5. CheerleaderOMI
6. WonderwallOasis
7. Aint No Mountain High EnoughMarvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell
8. (You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural WomanAretha Franklin
9. Under PressureQueen and David Bowie
10. Lose YourselfEminem

Go on, admit it. You heard a strain of Just a small town girl / Livin in a lonely world, didnt you? What about And I wish to you joy and happiness / But above all this, I wish you love? We might not know the whole song, and we might have even misheard or misremembered the lyrics, but a couple of lines like Maybe, youre gonna be the one that saves me / And after all, youre my wonderwallwell, they really stick, dont they? Theyre not called earworms for nothing.

What about lines from movies? We have friends who can quote whole scenes from The Big Lebowski. And everyone knows Ill have what shes having, from When Harry Met Sally... , or You complete me, from Jerry Maguire, or Im going to make him an offer he cant refuse, from The Godfather. It never ceases to amaze people what bits of useless dialogue they have rattling around in their brains. Jack Nicholsons courtroom testimony in A Few Good Men or Al Pacinos speech to the school board hearing in Scent of a Woman. Stupid gags from Ron Burgundy or Michael Scott. The esoteric musings of Dale Cooper. Whats the use of knowing all that stuff? Is our memory just a repository for random bits of pointless data?

And yet memorization used to be a central part of learning. I (Michael) am just old enough to remember, when I was a young student in Australia, being made to recite long swathes of poetry or learn multiplication tables by rote. We were forced to memorize the periodic table of elements, and (for some reason) we had to be able to recount every river that flows into the eastern seaboard of Australia from north to south, and the major towns on its banks! I hated itmostly because we got hit with a ruler if we got it wrong; things have changed a lot since then, thank goodness.