Sonic Truth: The Power of AI Music for Bible Memorization, part 2
A positive possibility for AI music
No Sugarcoating the Moment
Disappointment lurks everywhere for Christians in America. In just the last 25 years, around 40 million people have stopped going to church. For at least the last 5 years, church closures have outnumbered church plants.
And as bleak as these numbers are, statistics can’t capture the personal sense of discouragement that haunts many believers. In his book Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life, pastor Donald Whitney describes a common assumption:
“Your experience [of the Christian life] does not measure up to your expectation, so perhaps you conclude that you are the problem, that maybe you are a second-rate Christian.”
The Method Matters
In my experience, a lot of believers feel this way. Whitney writes that rather than some flaw in the person, the method used to engage the Bible is often the problem.
“Merely hearing or reading the Bible . . . can be like a short rainfall on hard ground. Regardless of the amount . . . of the rain, most runs off and little sinks in. Conversely, meditation opens the soil of the soul and lets the water of God’s Word percolate deeply. The result is an extraordinary fruitfulness and spiritual prosperity.”
For clarity, the word meditation here means to contemplate God’s Word. Christians have used the term that way for centuries. It doesn’t have anything to do with Buddhist practices or a new agey attempt to “empty your mind.”
Putting the Pieces Together
With that all cleared up, here’s a chart that connects a few dots:
The blocker is at the beginning: memorizing Scripture is really difficult. As best I can tell, few Christians today put much time into it. But what if the practice could be enjoyable? Consider the addition on the left side:
With AI, it’s possible to turn Bible passages into high-quality music of practically any style for little to no cost. I wrote more about that in part 1 of this post and have shared some examples on YouTube. But it’s not the technology or the music that’s most important. It’s the end result.
These Words Shall be on Your Heart
We all want a richer Christian life. And to understand how we can experience that, Deuteronomy 6:4-9 is really helpful:
“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”
Notice how a life filled with God’s Word is connected to what Jesus would later call the greatest commandment: “You shall love the Lord your God. . .” In Matthew 22:36-40, Jesus says that loving God with all our heart is our most important act of obedience, with love of neighbor springing forth from it.
Our love for God begins with God (1 John 4:19). After all, while we were still sinners, Christ died for us (Romans 5:8). And yet we also have the responsibility to arrange our lives so that our love of God will grow.
Few parts of the Bible present this responsibility as clearly as Deuteronomy 6. The passage helpfully grounds a Christian understanding of meditation in ordinary, everyday actions. You can contemplate the Word when you’re talking, when you’re walking, when you lie down, and when you rise. Writing verses on your hand or putting sticky notes with Scripture on the doorposts of your house would help. But if you’re willing to take it that far, why not try some memorization?
More Than One Road to Memorizing
If you’re among the rare Christians with a regular habit of storing God’s Word up in your heart (Psalm 119:11), you might not need the help AI music offers. And if you’re just weirded out by AI and want nothing to do with it, well, handwritten flashcards still work great.
But one way or another, we all need to immerse our lives in the Bible. And for most people, AI music that sings the Word of God will prove a huge help. As Donald Whitney points out, “merely hearing or reading the Bible. . .can be like a short rainfall on hard ground.” But when hearing the Word involves music, memorization becomes more effortless. And as the Scripture on your heart transforms more and more of ordinary life into meditation, you’ll come to know “an extraordinary fruitfulness and spiritual prosperity.”
