My church offers all kinds of enrichment classes.  I'm not very good with "fill in the blanks", or those film teaching things that everyone finds inspiring.  Which makes me feel really guilty.  So I sometimes go to the fill in the blank ones and then don't.  Fill in the blanks.  I start out good, I just don't seem to finish very well.

The other day, my friend Carolyn was talking about the subject of starting well and finishing poorly.  She mentioned Saul, the king of Israel.  Chosen by God, he disobeyed, and God regretted choosing him.  And David, a wonderful young man who was the next king, committed adultery, murder and was forbidden from building the temple.  Once he had sinned he couldn't go back and start over.

Well, not wanting to be a poor finisher, one year I enrolled in one of the classes that was being offered at the church.  I approached the teacher and told him, "I know that I will get the book for this class and then I won't fill in the blanks.  I will listen, I will learn.  I just want to be honest up front."

"Why are you taking the class," he asked me.

"I want to memorize the scripture you are teaching.  I know myself and in my heart I believe that memorizing the scripture will profit me in the long run more than doing the lessons.  I promise I will memorize the scripture."  And I did.  And different from textbooks, I still have the scripture in my head.''

Philippians 2:3-13

Continued.