Written by Andrew M. Davis, senior pastor of First Baptist Church in Durham, North Carolina

I don’t remember anything about May 15, 1997. I know I was a PhD student and that money was tight, but that day, Amazon went on the stock market with an initial public offer of $18 per share. As strapped as we were, I think I could have scraped together a thousand dollars to buy 55.5 shares of Amazon. If I had, that investment would be worth $1.87 million today.

Hindsight is 20/20. But it’s for this reason that the eternal and omniscient God has gone ahead of us in time to tell us what we’ll value on judgment day and into eternity. He’s made it plain that investing in his Word will return a hundredfold. Jesus promises, “If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. This is to my Father’s glory that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples” (John 15:7–8, NIV). I know of no better way to have Christ’s words dwelling in us than to memorize them!

This is especially important for pastors. We labor in the Word for the good of God’s people, that they may have eternal life and be richly rewarded for their service to him. Only by God’s Word can this happen. And it’s our unique privilege to give our lives to prayer and the ministry of his Word. Faithful pastors know God’s Word and minister in accordance with it. But even among the most faithful, very few habitually give themselves to extended Scripture memorization.

I want to plead with you to do this. For 39 years, I’ve devoted a large portion of my time to memorizing Scripture, even whole books of the Bible. That practice has paid immeasurable dividends in my preaching, teaching, writing, counseling, and evangelizing. Most importantly, it’s deeply affected my living as a child of God and servant of Christ. The practice has peeled back layers of mental dullness and has helped me to see magnificent truths in passage after passage of Scripture. God’s Word electrifies my soul, convicts me of sin, fills me with buoyant hope, and draws me into intimacy with Christ.

Need some encouragement to help you memorize? Pick up my booklet How to Memorize Scripture for Life: From One Verse to Entire Books (Crossway, 2024) or read Bradley Bell’s excellent TGC article “Be Ready with the Gospel: Memorize the Bible.”

Hear this sound tip for your eternal retirement: “Invest in the blue-chip stock of Scripture memorization. It will pay off infinitely better than Amazon!”

—Andy Davis