The other night after church while discussing an up coming meeting about our church’s Titus 2 ministry, the “baby” asked “When are y’all going to finish?”
What?
Then we figured it out. We ladies have, according to him, been studying Titus 2 for close to a year. He wanted to know when we would finish and move to another passage in the Bible!
Last night we were playing a game of horseshoes. You know that simple little game, easily played by all ages. However, for some reason none of us could score. It was ridiculous how long it took for the first person to get even get the first point. The enthusiasm for the game quickly dwindled. 🙁 I have always tried to teach the children to finish what they start, especially in relation to games. Nothing more frustrating than to be in the middle of a game and have the one losing decide to quit because they are bored or found some other reason to back out.
So after a while of playing my husband declared one more round would be the end for him. He finished his round and then went to sit on the porch stairs to watch the rest of the game. The baby (6 year old) looked at his dad and said:
“I’m not a quitter; I’m going to be a godly man!”
What !?!
Where did he get that idea?
But we couldn’t help it, we laughed and laughed. Dad will be getting teased for quite some time as to whether he is a quitter or a godly man.
Thankfully the baby isn’t a separatist. He sat beside his dad while waiting for his turn and said “I can still sit beside you.”
Some of us worked hard at being “godly” we continued on until it was so dark we couldn’t even see where the horseshoes landed. No one could even make it to five points which was the lowered ending goal. 🙁 Thankfully, a baby goat started screaming and we had to end the game to find out what was wrong. Nothing. But it served as a good excuse to end the game and not be “ungodly“.
Heard in the car on the way home from the park and bowling.
Middle Son: My upper arms hurt.
Baby with a quizzical look: You have two pairs of arms !?!
How can he understand things like that? Honestly that went over my head for a moment. I had no clue what he meant at first.
The baby who will soon turn six 🙁 is deep into trying to read. He is one of those that you really don’t have to do much encouraging. He is constantly sounding out words. Such a blessing!
The other day he picked up the Contenders for the Faith book and started sounding out a word.
Fuh
Aah
I
Tuh
Huh
Then we reminded him that the I makes the A say it’s name.
Fuh
Ay
Tuh
Huh
Then upon showing him my thumb he remembers that TH together makes the THuh sound.
Fuh
Ay
THuh
…
Faith!
That’s right what does faith mean?
Faith in Jesus Christ!
Good, but what does faith mean?
Long pause….
Faith a little girl at church.
We, of course, couldn’t help but laugh about that.
One of the best things about children is you just never know what they will say. Now granted every once in a while that can be quite embarrassing when in public. But this week we had a few humorous incidences.
List the names of three battles listed in this section in the order they occurred.
She listed Ticonderoga and Bunker Hill, but then she also listed Continental Congress. Congress is a battle? I almost gave it to her since she is more accurate than she realizes.
Spicy Roach
Month Wash
Turns out it was supposed to be Spicy Ranch Salad Dressing and Mouth Wash. 🙂 Obviously spelling isn’t a strong point around here! Wonder why?
Out of the mouth of my five year old while begging big sister to go outside with him.
Today’s Repentance Day.
He’s more accurate than he knows. Sounds like a better idea than Labor Day. Repentance is today.
Acts 2:38 (ESV) And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Mark 1:15 (ESV) “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.”
Acts 3:19-20 (ESV)
19 Repent therefore, and turn again, that your sins may be blotted out,
20 that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, …
Our hymn of the month for June was Come Thou Fount.
Come Thou Fount
Come, Thou Fount of ev’ry blessing,
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace;
Streams of mercy, never ceasing,
Call for songs of loudest praise:
Teach me some melodious sonnet,
Sung by flaming tongues above;
Praise the mount! I’m fixed upon it,
Mount of Thy redeeming love.Here I raise mine Ebenezer;
Hither by Thy help I’m come;
And I hope, by Thy good pleasure,
Safely to arrive at home:
Jesus sought me when a stranger,
Wand’ring from the fold of God;
He, to rescue me from danger,
Interposed His precious blood.O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I’m constrained to be!
Let Thy grace, Lord, like a fetter,
Bind my wand’ring heart to Thee:
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
Prone to leave the God I love;
Here’s my heart, Lord, take and seal it;
Seal it for Thy courts above.
We have been singing this song quite a bit over the past month. The other day in the car the baby was singing it at the top of his lungs as we were driving around. He has the tune down perfect and he has a good portion of the words down pat. However, he tends to sing “Come thou Fountain” instead of “Come Thou Fount“.
I asked the kids if anyone knew what a “fetter” was. As is typical with such a wide age range I started at the five-year old and worked my way up. The five-year old had no problem answering.
“It is a leaf-like thing that is on birds. They are for tickling.”
Needless to say there was a lot of hooting and hollering about his answer.
The next two had no clue. But the 15-year old and the 18-year old did know the answer.
So what fetter’s you?
Do you know what a fetter is?
Fetter
- A chain or shackle for the ankles or feet.
- Something that serves to restrict; a restraint.
Similar to hobbles on a horse or shackles on prisoners.
When I was growing up often we children were left on our own since my parents were divorced and my mother worked. I couldn’t tell you how many times we were told to not talk to strangers, let strangers in, go off with strangers, etc. Now that I’m older and have children myself, I personally don’t think teaching children to not talk to strangers is wise. Why? Because how can we ever love others and share the gospel if we are hindered by the “Don’t talk to strangers” warning. That of course doesn’t mean we should give strangers lots of personal information or be unwise, but “Don’t talk to strangers” has no qualifiers. It is hard to overcome that as adults. We tend to still avoid strangers. Not a good idea when we are told to go out and make disciples. (Matthew 28:19-20)
Anyway, because I do have some older teen children I’m able to run to Wal-mart or go get gas without hauling everyone with me each time like we did when they were young. One thing I have told the children and have stressed to the younger children is not to let strangers in the house without a parent here. That seemed to be a reasonable request.
Well, when the baby was four he all of a sudden got some bright idea. When I arrived back home after a short trip I was informed by him that he let the “stranger” in! He said it with much stress on the word “stranger“. The older children thought it was so funny. Turns out that right after I left he ran hollering to his room “I let the stranger in!” and hid under his bed. He has such a sense of humor, but the funnier part is he really didn’t understand what a “stranger” was! He just knew it must be bad if moma said to not let it in.
Now at five he understands what a “stranger” is, at least a little better, but just the other day he informed me upon my return that he let the stranger in.
My husband was out of town the other night and so things were a little different around here.
My youngest daughter cooked supper. We had corn muffins and baked beans for supper. Not quite the typical meal but good none the less and done totally by herself! Mom stayed out of the kitchen.
Then when we sat down to eat the baby (five) piped up that it was his turn to pray. He started off with the typical child prayer of “God is Great” but then flourished it some.
God is great and God is good.
Let us thank him for our food.
But then he added “Keep daddy safe”, etc. Which was a very sweet prayer since typically daddy prays over supper. But we didn’t know what he had in store for us later. 🙂
We finished eating and all of a sudden up he hops to go sit in his dad’s seat. Then he starts to ask us questions about the Bible. After asking a few questions he goes to a nearby shelf and gets Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology! He is going to teach us through that. Around a year ago my husband had used Systematic Theology as part of evening devotions. Our joke is that it is Gruesome Grudem, not for any reason other than the size of the book, 1291 pages. Actually the book is very easy to understand considering the depth of the topic. So needless to say the older kids started moaning and rolling their eyes thinking they would have to sit there through all those pages.
But the baby can’t read yet so we had some interesting questions.
How many chapters does Genesis have?
What chapter is the earth created?
What chapter was Adam and Eve created?
How many chapters have the death of Jesus?
How many chapters in Exodus?
How many books in the Bible?
Can you tell he was a little fixated on chapters?
But do you know those answers?
Pretty good for leading family devotions, don’t cha think?
My four year old came up to me this morning with his serious expression on his face.
He said, “I have something to say.”
Well, of course, momma listens well, no telling what might come out of his mouth.
After a minute of silence with his hand under his chin in the almost “Thinker” pose, he waved his hand at me as if to erase the previous statement.
“I have to think about it.”
And off he goes ….
What a hoot!
But wouldn’t we all benefit from “thinking about it” a little more.
Outta the mouths of babes.
