Do you ever find yourself struggling to retain what you read in the Bible? Or even to remember what you learned from a Sunday sermon or message? There are so many times that I have been deeply moved by a particular message at church, and months later I’ll find my notes from that message and realize I forgot all about the special thing the Lord spoke to my heart.
It can be embarrassing sometimes to recognize my inability to recall something that sincerely spoke to my heart. It’s not that I didn’t hear God speaking to me and desire to remember and apply what I learned. It just never found solid footing in my life, and I let it sit on the back burner of my heart long enough that it was simply forgotten. Don’t you wish we could find a way to remember and retain all of the beautiful truths we learn and keep them close in our hearts?
Something that has helped me tremendously in this area is the importance of SHARING what God is teaching me with someone else. When you teach the very things you are learning and pass them along to another person, those truths sink deeper into your own heart.
If you can teach it to someone else, your own understanding of that truth grows and becomes easier to remember.
When you read your Bible and God teaches you through it, share that with someone! You will mature in your knowledge and faith when you are able to teach someone else what God has taught you!
“Teaching the Bible” is an intimidating idea for most of us. Most of us would probably never describe ourselves as Bible teachers. You may feel you don’t KNOW enough, or perhaps you might be asked a question you won’t know the answers to! It is true that you cannot teach what you do not know and understand yourself, but what is different about teaching the BIBLE, is that the Holy Spirit Himself is able to speak through you and give you words to say! And also, it is completely normal and okay not to have all the answers!
Our faith grows when we step out and put our trust in God’s ability to speak through us! And once you do this a few times, you will begin to see that it is, in fact God who does the teaching, and you are simply his vessel—his voice—to speak to others.
Don’t be afraid to share what God has been teaching you, no matter how simple you may think it sounds!
Those truths will sink themselves deeper into your own heart, and you will get to see God use you to teach others!
And this can look different for each of us. You may want to find a friend who can be that person you share with on a regular basis—maybe you both can meet up during the week and share what God is teaching you that week. Or maybe you and your spouse can make an effort to share more with each other about your personal walks with Jesus. Another way that can be very helpful in maturing us and expanding our knowledge of the Bible is through teaching children! Teaching kids causes us to study the simple and foundational truths of Scripture in order to pass them along in a clear way. Pray about how God might want to be using you to teach someone else this week!
However you feel that this applies best to you, let me encourage you to start now! Be confident that God will use your willingness to share with others for both your own good and the good of others! Preach His Word, encourage one another, and watch how Jesus uses you!
“I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching.” -2 Timothy 4:1-2
