Keeping a Faith Journal - Christian Journaling explained
- Eljoh Hartzer, MTh
- Jan 8
- 6 min read
Updated: Jan 20
It’s easy to forget where we’ve been. We forget our prayers, the things we asked for, and we never thank God when He comes through. We forget Sunday’s sermon and don’t realize when the same verse comes up again and again. We forget what happened last month and last year, and so we don’t see a pattern when it appears.
Deuteronomy 6 verse 12 warns us: “Be careful! Don’t forget the Lord. You were slaves in Egypt, but he brought you out of the land of Egypt.”
This Scripture indicates something profound: The Israelites could forget Egypt. They could go on with their new life and forget how far the Lord has brought them - they needed to remember Him!
Revelation 12 verse 11 also confirms this idea: “They defeated him [the accuser] by the blood sacrifice of the Lamb and by the message of God that they told people.”
Another translation says, by the word of their testimony. Our God-words can help us defeat the enemy when he comes like a roaring lion, threatening to swallow us whole. Sometimes, we cannot see God’s goodness in the moment. That’s when it helps to page through old journals and proclaim: My God is real and He is here.
Consider Psalm 77 verses 11 to 12: “Lord, I remember what you have done. I remember the amazing things you did long ago. I think about those things. I think about them all the time.”
What do you think about all the time, friend? It’s easy to let our hearts get wrapped up in anxieties, worries, and concerns about the future. Writing down what God does can help us remember His amazing nearness when hard seasons come.
But remembering is not a one-and-done action. It is a daily choice to believe that who God was in the past determines who He will be for you tomorrow. Remember that He does not change, He is always the same. We can remember God and trust that if He did it once, He can do it again.
Joshua's Remembrance Stones - Writing Down What God Did for You
Let’s consider the remember-stones from Joshua 4:
“After all the people had crossed the Jordan River, the Lord said to Joshua, 2 “Choose twelve men, one from each tribe. 3 Tell them to look in the river where the priests were standing and get twelve rocks from that place. Carry these rocks with you and put them where you stay tonight.”
4 So Joshua chose one man from each tribe. Then he called the twelve men together. 5 He said to them, “Go out into the river where the Holy Box of the Lord your God is. Each of you must find one rock. There will be one rock for each of the twelve tribes of Israel. Carry that rock on your shoulder. 6 These rocks will be a sign for you. In the future, your children will ask you, ‘What do these rocks mean?’ 7 You will tell them that the Lord stopped the water from flowing in the Jordan River. When the Holy Box of the Lord’s Agreement crossed the river, the water stopped flowing. These rocks will help the Israelites remember this forever.”
One of the first faith journals I ever had was gifted to me by my husband, Armand, when we were still dating. The book was made from stones. Now that I’m looking back, I think this speaks of permanence, weight, and legacy. Each journal is a sign, like these rocks in the Jordan, reminding us of God’s past faithfulness.
What miracle or breakthrough has God done in your life that deserves a stone (a page in your journal?)
2 Corinthians 3:3
“You show that you are a letter from Christ that he sent through us. This letter is not written with ink but with the Spirit of the living God. It is not written on stone tablets but on human hearts.”
Questions about Keeping a Faith Journal
Journaling gives us the ability to have conversations with our past selves. Have you ever journaled before? If no - why not? If yes - why did you stop?
Which of the following emotions do you feel about journaling: fear of failure, disappointment of not following through, difficulty expressing myself
Do you think the Bible says anything about journaling? Why does it matter (as Christians) to process our thoughts and feelings well?
Bible Characters Who Kept a Journal
While the Bible does not have explicit mentions of a journal to my knowledge, there are a few times when we can see journaling as a practice represented in the Bible. Consider David, for instance. A humble shepherd boy turned King of Israel. David spent a lot of his time writing down the Psalms. We can imagine him sitting in a royal room, thinking up these things, or voicing them for scribes to pen down. David understood something of what it means to keep a track record with God. His Psalms cover a wide array of emotions and thoughts.
Psalm 3, for instance, is entitled ‘A song of David written during the time he was running from his son Absalom’. What does this mean? When David was pressed, stressed, and squeezed by life, the thing that came out of him was the desire to write to God.
“Lord, I have so many enemies.
So many people have turned against me.
2 They say to themselves, “God will not rescue him!” Selah
3 But you, Lord, protect me.
You bring me honor;
you give me hope.”
Or let’s look at the prophet Jeremiah who wrote Lamentations. Again, we find a person processing the events of their life and their time with the One True God. Lamentations 5 reads:
“ 20 You seem to have forgotten us forever.
You seem to have left us alone for such a long time.
21 Bring us back to you, Lord.
We will gladly come back to you.
Make our lives as they were before.
22 You were very angry with us.
Have you completely rejected us?”
Notice the various emotions present in just these three verses of Jeremiah’s writing. He starts with a hopeless heart, upset with God and confused about the situation. Then he turns soft, He invites God to bring about change. In the final verse, he remembers the anger again. But what’s remarkable here is the question at the end. Did you know that you are allowed to write down questions for God?
In fact, questions are a great way to start. This might look like: Lord, why can’t this happen on my timeline? Why do I have to wait? I don’t want to wait - would You make me patient?
Habakkuk is another example of an Old Testament prophet who expressed his worries and concerns to God in writing. Read Habakkuk 1 verse 13:
Your eyes are too good to look at evil.
You cannot stand to see people doing wrong.
So why do you permit such evil?
How can you watch while the wicked destroy people who are so much better?
Sometimes we feel hesitant to journal because we’re unsure of what might come out of us when we really face how we feel. The good news is this: The Bible is full of people just like you and me who had to wrestle with God. Jacob in Genesis 32 famously wrestled with the Lord, refusing to let go unless He blessed him.
“Jacob was left alone, and a man came and wrestled with him. The man fought with him until the sun came up. 25 When the man saw that he could not defeat Jacob, he touched Jacob’s leg and put it out of joint. 26 Then the man said to Jacob, “Let me go. The sun is coming up.” But Jacob said, “I will not let you go. You must bless me.” 27 And the man said to him, “What is your name?” And Jacob said, “My name is Jacob.”
28 Then the man said, “Your name will not be Jacob. Your name will now be Israel. I give you this name because you have fought with God and with men, and you have won.” 29 Then Jacob asked him, “Please tell me your name.” But the man said, “Why do you ask my name?” Then the man blessed Jacob at that place. 30 So Jacob named that place Peniel. He said, “At this place, I saw God face to face, but my life was spared.” 31 Then the sun came up as Jacob left Peniel. He was limping because of his leg.”
I think journaling is a lot like wrestling with God - and if we don’t let go until the sun comes up, we win!
This article is an excerpt from my Guide on Faith Journaling:
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