Hi, everyone. This is episode 1 65 on
the podcast, and we thank you once again
for joining us. Today's episode is gonna be
a really short 1. We just have a
couple quick announcements to make on this episode.
And the first 1 is 1 that Always
excited to make, and that is the August
summer challenge. This will be our fourth annual
summer memo challenge we've done psalm 01:03,
ephesians 1.
And last year, song 25.
And this year, really excited to be doing
Romans chapter 6. If you're looking for some
motivation to join this year's summer rem amortization
challenge, maybe other years you've tried and given
up or you didn't even try because it
didn't interest you. But you're needing a little
motivation. We'd encourage you to go back to
episode 24
where we give 10 reasons to tackle our
August summer challenge.
But, Matthew, I think we don't need to
repeat all those 10 reasons. I think, though
you have an eleventh reason maybe something that
you've God that's fresh for you and that
you can share with us to motivate us
to to memorize this important chapter. Yeah. In
our quickbooks books and parchment
episode a few weeks ago, I mentioned from
this book, the insanity of God, a great
story that teaches us the value of memorizing
scripture.
And,
the author is reflecting on, his time in
Russia and he was talking with people there,
about how their faith, how the and faith
survived how the church survived through communist
persecution. And he was speaking of this event
back in the fifties. So in the fifties,
they had AAA number of
small house churches that were spring up in
Russia,
but
the
believers who were part of these churches really
had no interaction outside of their very small
group of 10 or 20 people. And, of
course, the the leaders of these groups began
to wonder, hey, how how are these young
people going to meet other Christians so that
they can marry other Christians. So they had
this bold, some would say foolish idea of
organizing, like a big youth conference in Moscow
and inviting all of the young unmarried members
of all of these house church that they
knew from 18 to 30 years of age
to meet and encourage 1 another.
And, of course, they're hoping that there would
be some... They called us some spiritual cross
poll nation between the different house church foods.
And some people thought this is kinda foolish.
Like, don't you think if you've got 700
young believers
in Moscow in the early 19 fifties. Obviously,
the the communist government is gonna be aware
of this, and they were actually because when
the event was all over
the 3 pastors who had led that were
all arrested in sentenced to prison for 3
years each.
But I know they think it was worth
it.
And 1 of the interesting stories they tell,
so this this hasn't really been planned. But
at the beginning of the conference,
the young people were given a very interesting
challenge.
None of them had owned a Bible.
Boy, we take that for granted don't we,
but they did not own a Bible. They
never had him books or song books or
any recordings of Christian music.
So
at that conference they were challenged to determine,
you know, how how much bible truth is
present in this group. So they said this
will be like a game. Every day this
week, we want you to gather in small
groups. And we want you to see how
much of the 4 gospel Matthew Mark Luke
and John. You know and have memorized it
and in the group as a whole. What
can you piece together. So in your group,
see how much the gospel you can recreate?
And then do the same thing with songs
and him, and let's see how much of
that can be reproduced by memory.
At the end of the conference when they
compared and combine the efforts of all the
different small groups, the young people had
recreated all of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John
with only about a half dozen mistakes. Remarkable.
And they had recreated the lyrics of more
than 1200 songs and him of the faith
from their memory.
So,
Nick Rip in the author of the insanity
of God book says it became clear to
me in an instant why and how the
Christian faith had survived and often thrived under
decades
of communist depression in the Soviet Union. I
also understood what had enabled so many Russian
believers to remain strong and faithful.
Yeah. What a great story. They had the
word of God in their heart
and We want it in our mind so
that it can rest in our hearts and
be active there. And I'm I'm excited about
this. Mike, Romans 6 what a what a
fantastic passage of scripture to memorize.
I think it's gonna be a wonderful experience
for us this summer. Yeah. Well, that story
definitely inspires me to pick up the tap
of memorizing again. It's it's at least we
can do. Right? And and what a chapter
to have with us if we were 1
day
persecuted or in car rated or anything or
or even just...
For some reason, it lose our ability to
read. Right? Mh. Romans chapter 6 is an
awesome chapter. I'm I'm sure it's
I'm sure it's had a big impact on
you in your life, Matthew. It certainly has
in mind. It's been a huge part of
me learning how to fight temptation.
And learning about my union with Christ and
learning the nature of true freedom. And so
I I think I think this will be
a great time. Where We're planning to start
the challenge on July 28 officially. There. There
will be a post come on our website.
Pratt called you website with a schedule.
But, officially, we'll start memorizing on July 20
eighth, and then
at the end of each of those weeks.
So on on the Sunday night, we will
drop an episode that covers the previous 4
or 5 versus that we that we collectively
memorized. So Of course, you can still... As
says, we always say you can still benefit
from those episodes, even if you're not memorizing,
but I think the way to get the
maximum benefit of both memorizing and the episodes
is to do it altogether. And as Mike
has just said, there's so much value in
scripts or memo. Yes fighting temptation, even just
keeping our minds on an even ke, and
the liberty to
quote scripture and conversations with people, whether that's
debates with un believers or or in our
own preaching or something like that.
We do want to have a a few
extra prizes for you as well.
Again, you'll have a choice,
perhaps of some books And we also still
have some of the to,
practicality, prince of piece sweatshirt. They're lovely. And
we'd be happy to be able to give
some of those away as well. Correct? Yeah.
We have a small second limit in run
of them. And, yeah. There'll be Dolby options
for for choosing a prize
everyone, though, who finishes and who lets us
know at the end that they successfully memorized
Romans 6 will get a prize, and you'll
have some choice
in in the matter,
although there is a limited number of the
sweatshirt. So once those are gone, you'll have
to choose something else. But but, yeah, the
the real value is in the actual chapter
that's memorized of course. Yeah. So anything else
that we need to say about about summer
challenge there Matthew. I don't think Soc said
that's going to come out first on August
the fourth
So until that time, Mike? Yeah. Until that
time, you and I are taking a holiday,
not not together. I'm not sure that that
would be a holiday, but
we're taking a break from the podcast any
case. I've got some travel plans, and, a
mini holiday for our family plan.
And I don't know what you got going,
Matthew, but we just we just feel our
schedules need a little break. So we're gonna
take a few weeks off. So don't forget
about us. It doesn't mean the toxicology podcast
has ceased when you don't see a new
1 come out on July the fourteenth,
but we will be back with you in
August Lord Willing. Thanks so much for tuning
in. And we'll look forward to going through
Romans 6 with you. Hey, man. We'll see
you then.