Read Colossians 3
Colossians 3:16 says: Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom. Singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God. What a great, encouraging verse. When it comes to the word of Christ, to let it dwell in us, richly. I ask the question: Is the word of Christ dwelling in you, richly?
I mean, it's not just reading it and then kind of forgetting about it an hour later, but it's dwelling in you. It's living in you. This is why I'm convinced Bible memorization, memorizing verses, paragraphs, chapters, even books of the Bible is so important, because we want the word to dwell in us. We want to hide it deeply within us, to where it's just second hand to us. It's a part of us.
May the word of Christ dwell in us, richly. If you don't have an intentional plan for memorizing the Bible in some way. I want to encourage you to make that kind of plan so that the word of Christ might dwell in you. And then it just flows from you. This picture of teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom. When the word is dwelling in us, it just comes out of us. We're talking about it all the time. We're encouraging one another with it. We're warning one another with it.
As the word dwells in us, it flows from us in glorious ways, where we start singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in our hearts to God. We start singing the truths of God's word to one another in ways that encourage one another, with one another in ways that encourage one another. So, all of this is dependent, though, on the word of Christ dwelling in us richly.
So, let me encourage you today to make it a priority, not just to read the word, but to digest the word. To let it take up life in you. To dwell in you. Let's pray for that. Oh, God, we want your word to dwell in us richly. We don't want to be shallow in your word. We don't want to just know your word on a surface level, we want to know it well.
We want to know all of its riches and all of its fullness. We know that your word is a treasure that we get to unearth and experience and enjoy on a daily basis. So, God, help us to do that. May your word dwell in us richly. And as it does, may it flow from us. Help us to teach it to others. Help us to admonish others to encourage and correct others with it, even as we're encouraged and corrected in our hearts.
Help us to sing your word and the truths of your word with joy and thanksgiving in our hearts to you. Oh, God, make us a people, we pray, in whom your word dwells richly. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
The Pray the Word podcast is used with permission from Radical. For more from Pray the Word, visit radical.net.