Congratulations to the HCOS memorizers in this school year! 1 John was a challenging book to memorize but those who persevered will be blessed! There have been others who continued in James from last year and still others who memorized other verses. If you haven’t already reported your child’s success to your teacher, please do it now (by June 12) so that the prizes can be awarded. To each one who memorized, keep reviewing over the summer so that you don’t forget them! Enough review will put them into your long term memory and then you will have easy recall for the rest of your life!

Colossians, a book about the all sufficient Christ is the book that has been chosen for the HCOS Memorization Challenge for next year. It is so relevant for our children (and us) to memorize this book in these days where anything goes and Jesus Christ is seen by so many as only a good man in history. Jesus Christ is so much more……”He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by Him all things were created…….He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. “ (parts of Col 1:15 – 17). Not only do we learn about who Christ is and what he has done, but the second half of Colossians gives very practical instruction on how to live out ones faith in Christ. When your child reaches a time in their lives where they will be questioning who Jesus really is, the Holy Spirit can bring to their mind the verses they memorized in Colossians! What a rich book to have hidden in our hearts! What wonderful verses to be meditating on all year!

As we have done other years, there will be the ABC verses for younger children who haven’t memorized them yet, as well as selected verses for those who have. These are great verses with an ‘anchor’ of the alphabet as your child begins his memorizing career! Remember that any verses that your child memorizes, from Sunday School or Awana or a course your family is doing, can be used for the HCOS Memorization Challenge. These verses will need to be reviewed and recited to a non-family member by a date in June. Our goal with the Memorization Challenge is to encourage families to make memorization a priority. We all know it should be, but it is so easy to let it slip to doing after everything else is done, unless we make an active choice for it to be a top priority. By needing to say the verses all at once at the end of the year, children won’t memorize quickly and forget just as quickly. The goal is to have God’s Word remain in our hearts for the rest of our lives! Review, review, review!

I have had the wonderful experience this year of leading a ladies’ Bible Study on Philippians. Because of having memorized it 2 years ago, I have spent a lot of ‘think’ time in this book, and was able to lead the ladies deeper as a result. As a finale, I recited the entire book to them as if I was Paul writing it. What a rich experience for all of us, as the book flowed, with dramatic emphasis on various parts. Many ladies commented that it made the book ‘alive’ to them! I could only do this because I have continued to keep the book fresh in my mind. Don’t stop at memorizing! Review, review, review!

Roberta, a teacher with HCOS, who has memorized James and will complete 1 John in the summer wrote:

You know how God has given you special verses from his Word over the years that mean a lot to you personally. Those verses become “yours”. Memorizing an entire book of the Bible makes all those verses “yours” too. Whenever you hear a sermon or read an article that quotes one of “your” verses it grabs your attention more and helps you to get more out of what is being said.

For those of you that have already memorized a book or two or three, let me encourage you to read a commentary on one of those books and you will find that you will get a lot more out of them because by memorizing and meditating on those verses you have already started to “dig deeper” into them.

For those of you that have not yet joined the HCOS memorization challenge, let me encourage you to plan now in your heart to do so in the fall. September is such a busy time for homeschoolers and just the thought of adding one more thing to your already busy schedule at that time means it probably won’t happen. But if you can get started in the summer and make it a habit to learn three new verses a week you will have a whole book memorized by the end of the next school year and will have added 95 more verses to the list of those that are special to you.

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