100 Verse Challenge - Week 3

I hope everyone in this Challenge is enjoying this adventure as much as I am. I'm getting a real kick out of learning new scriptures, and reading Robert J. Morgan's insights about the verses. I highly recommend the book 100 Verses Everyone Should Know By Heart. HOWEVER, the book isn't necessary to participate. And if you want to learn a lot of scripture along with me and a couple hundred other hungry folk, you can RSVP on Facebook or follow along here and join in the fun.

The first two weeks we covered the "Four Corners" of our faith. And you can click back to Week 1 and/or Week 2 if you need to catch up. Or you can jump in now as we continue on and start down what Morgan refers to as "The Roman Road."

"The Roman Road" Morgan tells us "is one of the most effective presentations for people who have heard the message (of the gospel) but need to see it in black and white." It's an encapsulation of the whole Bible, a clear concise expression of God's plan of salvation. Once you have these verses down, you are in essence "fully equipped" to share the Good News.

I warned you in the beginning that there may be a few weeks where we had an extra verse to learn in a giving week. This is one of those weeks, we have three verses for week three. But I think you will find them short, and for some of you they may be familiar again. (Isn't it kind of exciting to realize you already know some of the verses that you "should"?

So here we go, week three's 3 verses:

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Romans 3:23

Only one person has ever been without sin and remained that way, and this verse is the statement of "why" behind our need for Him as Savior.

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 6:23

Death is what we've earned, but eternal life is the gift God has freely offered in His Son. Morgan reminds us of the word picture many have seen with us in our sin on one side and God and the gift unreachable on the other. He reminds us that only Christ's cross can serve as the bridge between the two.

But God proves His own love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us! Romans 5:8

Personally I love that this scripture ends in an exclamation point, and as I learn it with my kids this week my intention is to speak it with that force. This is exciting news! Christ died for me! I have said often, "He loved us at our worst first." And too often as believers we get bogged down in our "ought to's and should's" and buy into the lie that if we are falling short, God somehow loves us less. So not so. So not so!

On that note, I want to say a little something about the Challenge. There's been a lot of discussion about the "right" way to do the Challenge. Can I just say one more time? This Challenge is what you make of it. There is no wrong way to do it. Some people are adamant that they want to learn it in their own versions. More power to you! If that works for you, great! The point it getting it. I have people who if they know a verse already they are just bypassing it. OK, great - but I would encourage you, you might be missing out, but again, so be it. I have another (English speaking) friend who is memorizing all the verses in Spanish because of her heart for outreach and missions. More power to her.

I do recommend you give time and effort to this Challenge, the more you put in, the more you get out. BUT I also say, if you only memorizing 1/10th of the list, you're still way ahead of where you would be if you hadn't even tried. So let go of your ought to's and should's and make the best of the adventure!

Get busy now, start working on week 3: