When I was a child, my mother had a cedar chest where all our precious things from childhood were stored. And now that I am a mother, I have one. Inside my cedar chest I hide baby blankets, clothing, books, artwork, letters and pictures.

The chest is not a place for ordinary things, but those with value. It holds pieces of an innocence never to be retrieved.

Part of the reason for the cedar chest is to keep these things from my children themselves. Although it is not locked, they have an innate understanding that what is in the chest is to be kept. It’s the story of who they are and what needs to be remembered. These items tell a story that they themselves are cherished and loved.

Psalm 119:11 says, “Your word I have treasured in my heart.” Spurgeon noted that the author laid (Scripture) up in the place of love and life. Our hearts are our treasure chests.

Scripture has much to say about the heart. The heart is the seed of our existence. Out of it flows who we are. David had a heart after God, but Solomon’s heart was divided. Jeremiah said that the heart is deceitful and Solomon, knowingly, wrote to protect it because out of it flow the wellsprings of life.

In the Divine Conspiracy Dallas Willard penned, “If you bury yourself in Psalms, you emerge knowing God and understanding life.” It seems in this sentence he could be summarizing the second set of the Divine Alphabet, letter Bet.

Many scholars believe that Bet represented Jesus because it suggests that God intended to live with us. Scholars say that Bet is a mouth out of which the breath of aleph emerges. Both creation and Scripture came through God’s breath.

Our author, we’re sticking with Ezra if you recall, advises that submerging ourselves in God’s Word is the way to guard our life from getting entangled into sin.

From the path of his feet to his heart, from his speech to his memory, Ezra wants to saturate himself in Scripture. He knows that this is the way to living a life that pleases God and ultimately leads to happiness.

I Timothy 3:16-17 says, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”

Scripture memory seems to be one of those lost disciplines as we continue to have more access to the text. It is indeed at our fingertips nearly all of the time. If you have the Bible App downloaded on your phone, or even the ability to Google, you can find the Scripture you are thinking of within a few seconds.

I think there is still a valid argument for memorizing scripture. It’s kind of like when we (those of us growing up without cell phones) told our 3rd grade teachers that we didn’t need to memorize the times table because we could just use a calculator, but she told us we wouldn’t always have a calculator with us. But now we do always have a calculator. However actual mathematicians, accountants, and math teachers don’t use their calculator for basic multiplication facts. They know the facts intimately. They can spout them off of the top of their head.

We are meant to be truly acquainted with the Words of God because they speak life to us. They guide us in what is right or wrong. They remind us who we are and who we worship. When we saturate ourselves in the Word of God, we are saturating ourselves in Him.

I love the moment in Luke 2, just after Jesus is born, when Mary treasured everything in her heart. Imagine Mary soaking up every moment with Jesus. She would have memorized the lines on his fresh, tiny fingers. She knew just exactly how he crinkled his nose. She had his cries and his giggles memorized. She carefully documented the stories surrounding his life in her heart so that she could tell and retell them.

I bet these memorized moments of angel visits and miracles held her strong when Jesus’ life was being threatened. I imagine they comforted her in the hours of his crucifixion.

John unlocks these secrets for us even further when he wrote, “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He existed in the beginning with God. God created everything through Him.” Do you see the beauty of this?

Jesus was the breath-agent of creation and Jesus is the breath of God’s words to us. Saturating ourselves in the Word of God is how we become like Jesus because we are immersing ourselves in Him. It’s how we live a life free from the tangles of sin. Jesus said in John 15 that his words are the secret to living a life filled with His overflowing joy.

What are you storing up in your place of love and life?