As soon as your child can talk they can begin memorizing scripture! But you may become overwhelmed when you try to teach your kids to memorize scripture.
Do you sing songs? Pick short, easy verses? Which verses should you start with? All these questions flooded our minds as we considered the best way for our toddlers to memorize Bible verses.
We knew we wanted them to learn large chunks of scripture, and hide them in their hearts for life. We didn’t want the classic short verses to be the only Bible verses they had memorized. And, we wanted these verses to come to their minds each year of their life and not escape their memory.
Our strategy was habit stacking and consistency. And to our surprise, it worked exceedingly well! Our 2-year-old and 3-year-old both have large passages of scripture memorized, including full passages like Psalm 1, Psalm 8, and Psalm 23. They have also almost completely memorized Romans 12. We don’t say this to brag, but to show you that it is possible (and easy to do)!
Here are all the details on how you can begin having your children memorize today…
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Our Secret: Habit Stacking
You may have heard of habit stacking before, particularly in books like Atomic Habits. I didn’t realize this was what we were doing at first, but then I noticed it was exactly what we were doing and it worked just like all the professionals say!
Habit stacking is taking a habit you already do, something you may not even notice you do every day, and adding another habit to it. It’s much easier to accomplish your goals when you habit stack than trying to implement something completely new into your routine.
For example, if you brush your teeth every night before bed, you can habit stack a new goal on top of that, like saying a Bible verse you are trying to memorize. It forces the habit to stick and not be forgotten.
When we sit down to eat a meal as a family, which is every meal almost every day, we start by praying for our food and then we recite our memory verse. When our verse ends we begin with our meal. We habit stack the scripture memory onto our prayer before each meal.
It forces us to say our verse(s) three times a day. And we can’t eat until it’s said!
Because we do this daily with our toddlers, only 2 and 3 years old, they already have almost 10 large passages of scripture memorized! They can remember the verses so quickly and easily just by being consistent.
Sometimes we add hand motions to our verses to help the kids stay focused on longer passages. You could also make the verse to a tune or song to help too! Just remember to keep it consistent and pick a time to habit stack that best works for your family. It needs to be something you do every day, preferably multiple times a day, for it to work.
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Keeping It In Their Minds
We have noticed that after they have one passage of scripture memorized and we move on to the next, they can forget some of the previous passages over time. The way we combat this is by having an additional scripture memory time in the evening during family devotions.
After our family devotions conclude, where we read the Bible and pray together, we then have the kids stand up and say a passage of scripture that we pick at random.
We only give them the Bible reference and then expect them to remember the passage from that. It works so well at keeping every single passage of scripture that they have memorized fresh in their mind. Sometimes we also let them pick which verse or passage they would like to recite to keep it a bit more fun for them.
Once your kids have memorized a verse or passage of scripture, be sure to keep bringing that passage up again over the weeks and years so they don’t forget it. It will stick like glue!
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How To Teach Your Kids To Memorize Scripture: Creating Family Culture
I didn’t dive into the “why” behind memorizing scripture. Why is it so important? Why start at such a young age? Can’t they just learn it later at youth group or Christian school? I hope to dive into a blog post on this topic later.
But if you agree with us on the importance of scripture memory, then give habit stacking a try! And also, remember to keep bringing those verses up again throughout the weeks, months, and years ahead.
You are giving your children a gift of eternal knowledge that will stay with them their entire lives. Start as early as possible and stick with it! It creates a family culture and a bond, where our children know the importance of scripture at a young age.
As parents, we find so much joy when we randomly hear our children saying verses in the car or while playing around the house. Or, when they break out in song singing “Jesus Loves Me” or “The Doxology.” Nothing fills our hearts more than to hear our children reciting and singing the truth!
Will you implement these tips to teach your kids to memorize scripture? How will habit stack scripture memory into your day? Let me know in the comments below!
Kelsey at GoodPointGrandma
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