Bible Sunday

Every year our church presents the second graders with a Bible.  The Bibles are presented in the worship service and afterward there is a celebration with treats and activities.  It is a great way to demonstrate the importance of this event and also help the new Bible owners get to know their Bibles a bit.

This year TM and D. were due for their Bibles.  This has been a source of great excitement for several months now... and for some, anything that is exciting also causes a significant amount of stress, but I digress.  This excitement was in part due to having four older brother and sisters who already had their own Bibles.  TM and D. have been wanting their own Bibles for a while now, especially since they can both read.  J. and I certainly could have bought them a Bible earlier this year, but we waited for the church presentation Bible.

There are a few reasons we did this.  The first being that delayed gratification is a good skill to practice.  We live in an instant society where we rarely have to wait for anything.  An inability to wait for some thing one wants contributes to all sorts of social ills, being captive to huge amounts of debt being one of them.  It is good to practice waiting.  Also, by waiting and anticipating something, it makes actually receiving the desired object that much sweeter.  And especially with a Bible, this is a feeling we want to inculcate.  Lastly, for our family, receiving a Bible is one of the markers of childhood; a marker that shows a child they are growing up.

Our society does a pretty poor job of creating markers to show a child they are maturing.  The biggest one is hitting the age of 16 and being able to obtain a driver's license.  But children need more than that and they need some ceremony to go along with those markers.  Instead of making children wait and anticipate things they are finally old enough to do, we tend to push our children ahead. 

There are all sorts of ways we can create markers of maturity for our children.  It can be as small as having a child wait until they are 13 to get her ears pierced and use that as one of the markers of young adulthood or it can be bigger... a family ceremony acknowledging an adult level of responsibility in a child about to go off on their own.

Anyway all this to say, getting a Bible is a pretty big deal around here... as receiving The Book which contains the words of life should be.

Comments

Anonymous said…
The boys look so excited. What a joy to see two young men who are holding the most precious book we have, God's Word to mankind.
Kim Crawford
4/12/2011 11:25 AM
MissMOE said…
I really enjoyed this post. So true.
4/12/2011 2:08 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Making bias tape... otherwise known as the Sew, Mama, Sew! Giveaway

Image
( Sorry, the contest is now closed .... though you're welcome to leave a comment if you like.) [This picture has absolutely nothing to do with this post, but is here solely to give Blogger a different photo to post in the thumbnail.] It's Sew, Mama, Sew Giveaway time again.  I love bias tape.  It is so useful and so easy to use... finishing edges ... finishing seams ...  And while the pre-packaged stuff has it's place and I use it often, I really like to have patterned bias tape as well.  Enter one of my favorite little tools: the bias tape maker.  This one make 3/4 inch bias tape and I will be giving one away at the end of this post.  But first, I thought some of you might like to see what it does if you've never used one before. I don't have a rotary cutter, nice cutting mats, or even a proper cutting table (I cut-out things on my floor), so if I can do this, so can you.  Here is my admittedly quirky method. Step 1:  Lay out the fabric and fold a corner ove
Read more

An uncomfortable post

I hope it comes as no surprise to my readers that when I vote early next week I will be casting my ballot for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz. Being in a blue state this feels as though it is a very little thing in the effort to bring our country back past the brink of no return . I'll be honest and say that I am feeling such stress and fear about this election that I can't listen to any news or look at social media for very long. The radio is pretty firmly set on our classical music station even though they are in the middle of a pledge drive. The pledge drive is preferable.  But for those of you who are supporting the other side, if there are any of you left who continue to visit my blog, here is what I need to say. When I drive around and see signs in people's yards supporting that man, I treat it as an early warning system. The people who live in this house are not safe for my family to be around. This is far more than a difference of opinion. That worked for all the preside
Read more

Sew, Mama, Sew! Giveaway

Image
Sew, Mama, Sew! is hosting another giveaway day , the day where many bloggers giveaway things they have made or supplies to make things or both.  It is great fun to visit a lot of blogs and try to win cool stuff.  So fun that I thought I would participate this year. I had great hopes of making a set of coordinating mother/daughter aprons.  But reality reared its ugly head and I came to terms with the fact that my time is not limitless.Instead of aprons,  I must continue to spend quality time with yards and yards of red plaid flannel.  What am I making?  Well, as I tell my children, it is the season not to ask questions... I will be able to let you know sometime after the 25th. Instead of making something, I went to my favorite thrift store and found some supplies in the form of sheets and pillowcases (some of my favorite raw material).  I'm giving away three pillowcases and one twin flat sheet. I decided to go with bright, springy colors, because if you are anything like
Read more