The Value of Writing Down What God Is Teaching You (No. Not Journaling.)

Not Journaling. Certainly Not Keeping a Diary.

Simply Writing Down What God is Teaching You on Occasion.

I don’t remember when I started doing it or even who it was that encouraged me to start. It seems that maybe it was around the time I started seminary that I started writing down a few of the things God was teaching me. Maybe it was a professor who encouraged us to start doing so? Maybe it was in one of the books I had to read for class? I had heard of the value of journaling, but that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m just talking about occasionally writing down valuable things God is pointing out.

I’ve been doing this now for more than 25 years. I don’t write something down every day, but as I read God’s Word each morning, if something strikes me in a way that I think is important or challenging or points out something I hadn’t noticed before, I write it down. And if I hear something really helpful in a sermon, I write it down. And if I read something of great value in a book, I write it down. (Again… this is not the same as journaling.)

You can do that in the margins of your Bible, or in the front or back pages of your Bible. You can do this on scrap pieces of paper. You could even use a notebook. I have done all of that at various times. But I then keep all of that info in one place. And occasionally I go back through my scribblings and scratchings to see what God might point out to me from what I had previously thought was valuable. It is always interesting to see what God was pointing out to me at different times of my life.

And as I have been doing so, I have come across a few ideas that I thought might also interest you. And so when that happens, I’ll share those ideas for us to consider together. Here’s one I ran across from a few years ago when I was reading through Genesis:

In Genesis 15, God establishes his covenant with Abram by having Abram take sacrificial animals, cut them in half and lay the halves apart from each other, creating a path down the middle between the split animal halves. (Seems a bit odd, right?)

The Study Bible I was using that year provided a helpful explanation:

This type of ceremony was not uncommon in that day and age. An agreement is being made between the superior party and the inferior party. The superior typically promised protection and the inferior promised service. And typically the inferior was the one who walked through the halves as an indicator that he realized this would happen to him if he did not keep his end of the bargain.

But here are the two big differences between the typical covenant and this one that God made with Abram.

1) Typically, the inferior’s list of duties were longer than the superior’s. But that isn’t the case here. God had much more listed: protection, blessing, descendants, land, care for future generations, wealth, & peaceful death. Abram’s list of duties were minimal – they are not even mentioned, but we assume it is simply to believe in the Lord’s promises (15:6). The focus is on what the Lord promised Abram, not what Abram promised the Lord.

2) The inferior party is also the one who typically would have walked through the pieces to indicate his death if he broke covenant, yet here we have a symbol of God passing through the pieces, indicating that He would die before He would allow His covenant with Abram to fail.

And that is exactly what happened! Jesus did die to fulfill His covenant with Abraham. And through Jesus’s death, Abraham became a father of many, and Abraham’s descendant (Jesus) became a blessing to all nations. What an amazing story of God’s faithfulness to His promises!

So this is just one of the types of things I would jot down as something helpful to me when reading the Bible during my quiet time. And now, with new technology, it’s even easier. I can simply open up a note-taking app on my phone and type in the thought, whether at home or when listening to a sermon. I want to encourage you to begin occasionally writing down what God is telling you. Whether you do it in the margin of your Bible, in a notebook, or in a note-taking app on your phone – keep up with the ideas that God points out to you as you engage with His Word. And go back on occasion to see how God has worked in your life over time!

(And as I’ve pointed out several times now. This is not journaling.)

Wait… is this journaling? Well, if it is, just don’t tell anyone. Because I’ve found that word turns some of us off.

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