As Keith says, we are so typical it’s embarrassing.  Be that as it may, let me tell you about my grandson.

He had just turned two.  As he sat there in his high chair licking the frosting off his cupcake he quite deliberately read the letters on his Happy Birthday sign, the one that used to hang over our dining room windows when his father and uncle had a birthday, “H-A-P-P-Y,” all the way through to the end, never missing a letter.  Then he told us what colors the letters were, each one different.  Before that he had recited the alphabet, not sung it mind you, but recited it.  Then he had counted to nearly 20 and recognized all the numbers.  All day he had been pointing out shapes, including “oval” and “rhombus.”

Shortly after we had arrived, his granddad had read him a book.  “See the fish?” he said.

”Dolphin,” two year old Silas instantly corrected.

His parents told us about a time a couple months before when a friend from church had come walking through the restaurant where they sat.  “Hi Mark,” they said, and suddenly my 22 month old grandson was reciting, “Luke, John, Acts, Romans,” taking up right where he thought his parents had left off. 

Isn’t it normal for parents and grandparents to brag on their kids?  Do you think God doesn’t have the same feelings we do?  When I brag on my grandson, when I say he is the cutest, smartest little boy in the whole world, I am simply living up to the image in which I was created.  “Have you considered my servant Job?” God asked Satan.  “There is none like him in all the earth.”

At least twice God spoke from Heaven about his Son, “This is my Son in whom I am well pleased.”  Don’t you know God loved saying that?

When God made Israel his chosen people, his children, he had every right to expect them to behave like his children should.  Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation, Ex 19:5,6. 

When they didn’t he was just as devastated as we would be if our children did not behave themselves well. For as the loincloth clings to the waist of a man, so I made the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah cling to me, declares the LORD, that they might be for me a people, a name, a praise, and a glory, but they would not listen, Jer 13:11.

In a Messianic passage, Isaiah speaks of the coming kingdom, the church.  You shall be a crown of beauty in the hand of the LORD, and a royal diadem in the hand of your God. You shall no more be termed Forsaken, and your land shall no more be termed Desolate, but you shall be called My Delight Is in Her…for the LORD delights in you, Isa 62:3,4.  Just as Old Testament Israel had the chance to make God proud of them, we have that chance today. 

What would people think about your Father if they saw your behavior and heard you speak?  What would they think if they saw how you treated the poor, the sick and the weak?  What would they think if they saw how you drive, how you dress, how you work for your employer?  All some people will ever know about God is what they see in you.

Make your Heavenly Father proud enough to brag about you today.  “Have you seen my child?  There is none like him in all the earth.”

His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire, 2 Pet 1:3,4.

Dene Ward

            I hardly ever go to the mall.  Because our finances have always been tight, I only shop for things when I need them, otherwise it seems to me an exercise in futility.  I can’t afford to get “tired” of something.  If it works, we use it.  If it hasn’t fallen apart yet, we wear it.  Yet sometimes I have to make that trip, usually once a year, twice at the most.  The first time I made it with a toddler and a babe in arms was almost disastrous. 
              
            Both my boys were obedient little boys.  Not that they came that way—it took a lot of effort and consistent training because they both had Ward blood in them, but eventually I never had to worry about taking them anywhere.  Two year old Lucas followed along as I traipsed from store to store looking for—well, I don’t even remember now.  I had Nathan in one arm, a diaper bag on the other, and my purse over one shoulder, so there was no hand to hold on to Lucas.  He was usually right by my side, and if he suddenly disappeared, I looked back and he had just lagged a bit as we went by a particularly eye-catching display.

            Then, just as we left one of the anchor stores on the far side of the mall, and stepped into the open area, I looked down and he wasn’t there, nor anywhere close.  My heart plummeted, my stomach heaved, and my mind screamed his name before I could even get it out of my mouth.  I ran back into that store, and there ten feet inside, he was standing by a display.  What had caught his interest I don’t know--I doubt I ever knew.  I called his name and he looked at me and smiled and came running.  Me?  I knelt on the floor and somehow with a squirmy four month old and a diaper bag and a purse, I managed to wrap him up in my arms and hug him so tightly that he started to pull away.

            “You need to be careful to stay with Mommy, okay?” I managed with a slight catch in my throat, and he nodded happily.  On we went to do the necessary shopping, but my eye was on him far better than it had been before.

            I doubt very many of you have not had something similar happen to you.  It is, perhaps, the worst feeling in the world to think your child might be lost.

            It amazes me when people do not have that same horrible feeling when their child’s soul is lost.  How can you not run around calling his name and asking people for help?  How can you not agonize about it?  I want to share with you two wonderful examples should you ever need them—which I pray neither you nor I ever do. 

            We have spoken with the lost child of a close friend more than once, offered to study the Bible, and just conversed about life in general at other times.  She appreciates everything we try to do for her child, whether it works or not.  She has even told her child, when that child was mildly disgruntled about one conversation, “Isn’t it wonderful that they care so much?” which effectively put that problem to rest. 

            I keep in contact with the child of another friend.  That child is not amenable to spiritual discussions these days, but he knows I will say something every time anyway, and probably because of his good parents, he accepts my overtures in a friendly way, tolerant when I leave him with a statement like, “You know what you need to do.”  She has told me she doesn’t care what I say to her child, “Just please keep saying something.”

            Neither one of these parents allow their children to complain in their presence about the ways we approach them.  Neither one of them blames us or anyone else for the decisions their adult children made, and their children know that too.  I carry great hopes for both of those children, and for those grieving parents.  I feel like their lost children will indeed be “found” some day, partly because of the attitude their parents have managed to keep throughout the whole ordeal. 

            If you have a lost child, follow their example.  As long as you allow that child to blame someone besides himself, he will never see the need for repentance.  As long as you allow her to make excuses, whether justified or not, she will think everyone else is at fault, not her. 

            When I lost Lucas for those few minutes, I didn’t care who helped find him, or what I looked or sounded like as I went running and hollering back into that store.  I just wanted my baby safe and sound.  Can you imagine someone saying, “No!  I don’t want you to look for my child?” 

            Your child may be standing right in front of you, but if his soul is lost, he might as well be a helpless toddler lost at the mall.  Do what you need to do, and accept the help of others without hamstringing them. I lost my little boy once.  I don’t want to ever go through that again, but if I do, rest assured, I will be calling you for help to find him, and I won’t care a bit how you go about it.

But the father said to his servants, 'Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet. And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate. For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.' And they began to celebrate, Luke 15:22-24.

Dene Ward

“Do it myself!” What parent has not heard these words from his toddler with mixed feelings? Yes, he is learning to do things for himself, all by himself, without my help. Good for him! Yes, he is learning to do without me. Some day he won’t need my help at all. Some day he will experience his own Independence Day, and we will face it with pride in his accomplishment and tears for our own loss at the same time.

And don’t we prize that independent feeling ourselves? I have a good friend who is 93. She and I have often bemoaned the fact that people no longer seem to understand the word “need.” What they think they “need” is usually just
something they “want.” It worries us that we are becoming more and more
dependent on wealth and the technology it buys. We have said to one another, if someday there is a great catastrophe, most of the country won’t know how to
survive at all. She has a colorful way of putting it: “They won’t even know how
to go to the bathroom!”
 
We have lived in the country for a long time, and I have learned a lot about doing things myself. I don’t know when was the last time I bought a jar of
jelly at the store. Or pickles. Or canned tomatoes. Or salsa. Or any sort of
frozen vegetable at all. I do it myself.
 
For awhile we had chickens. Until we finally figured out that we were barely breaking even between the cost of feed and the “free” eggs, we gathered
jumbos every day, half a dozen or more. Keith milked a cow, and I often had a
sour cream pound cake sitting on the countertop, made with our eggs, our
homemade butter, and our homemade sour cream. I mashed potatoes we grew with our fresh cream and homemade butter. The ice cream we churned was so rich we often saw flecks of butter in it.  I think maybe we gave up the cow the day we actually started feeling our arteries clog as we looked across the table at one another.
 
A lot of people can and freeze vegetables, jams, and pickles, but it always gave me a little extra pride when I made things that most people never even thought about making, like ketchup from the tag ends of the tomato crop, and chili powder from the cayenne peppers I grew and dried. Lots of folks made applesauce, but not many can their own apple pie filling to use later in the year. Another friend I have makes her own laundry starch. If anything dire does happen in the next few years, my two special friends and I promise to share. I am sure the 93 year old will be happy to tell you how to dig an
outhouse.

 But that sort of pride and independence can get in the way of our salvation, can’t it? There really is nothing we can do to save ourselves. And we must learn to depend upon God—he demands it. He is to be the one we trust, the
one we rely on, the one we go to for every need we have, even if our definition
of need is really “want.” 
 
As long as I think I can manufacture my own salvation and experience a
spiritual Independence Day, I will never find myself in God’s good graces, or in
His grace. This is one case where self-reliance is disastrous. This is one case
where we celebrate Dependence Day instead. Have you celebrated yours yet?
 
By grace have you been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God,  Eph 2:8
 
Dene Ward

It takes us three days to pack for a camping trip.  I have a list saved on the computer that I print out every time—three pages.  Yes, I said three pages.

Just for meals, for instance, I pack cups, mugs, plates, soup bowls, a measuring cup, grill tools, saucepans, skillets, the coffee pot, propane stoves, matches, gas canisters, coffee filters, a griddle, a folding grill, a mixing bowl, silverware, mixing spoons and spatulas, foil, Ziplocs for leftovers, a bacon drippings can, paper towels, dish soap, a dish pan, dish towels, hot pads, and trash bags, and that doesn’t count the food!  Now imagine things you need for every part of your day, from brushing your teeth, to hiking, to showering, to sitting around after dark reading, to going to bed, and you begin to see why the list is three pages long.

We use this list because I have found that if I don’t have it to cross off, I will invariably forget something.  From time to time we delete something on the list or add something as our situation changes.  When we were young we didn’t need to take two boxes of medications. 

We keep a backup disk of items saved on the computer.  That list is on it.  Should we ever lose it, I might even be tempted to never go camping again.  I cannot imagine having to remake the list from memory.  More likely, we would remake it around the fire the first night after discovering all the things we forgot.

When we had boys with us, I had other things on the list that were equally important.  In fact, I was probably more careful about their things than mine.  I wanted them to have enough clothes, especially enough warm clothes.  I learned that lesson the hard way when we woke up by a mountain stream one June morning to fifty degree temperatures and they had nothing but shorts and tee shirts to wear.  Fifty degrees in June?  As a Florida native I didn’t even know that was possible, and I felt horrible, quickly mixing up some warm oatmeal and hot chocolate while Keith built a campfire for them to huddle around as they ate.

We are all on a trip every day of our lives.  What have you packed for your children?  Too many parents just let life happen without a plan.  Do you teach them?  Do you talk with them every chance you get about a God who loves them, who made them, and who expects things of them?  Do you discuss the things that happen in their lives and the decisions they made, or perhaps should have made?  Do they know that those decisions will affect their eternal destiny?  Do you allow them to pay the consequences for their mistakes, or do you shelter them?  Do you tell them what the world is really like out there, how to recognize the traps, the enemies in disguise and the true values of life?  Are you sure you have everything they could possibly need to assure their eternal destiny?

Maybe you need to make a list.

We will not hide them from their children, but tell to the coming generation the glorious deeds of the LORD, and his might, and the wonders that he has done. He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers to teach to their children, that the next generation might know them, the children yet unborn, and arise and tell them to their children, so that they should set their hope in God and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments; Psalms 78:4-7.

Dene Ward

“Mommy, those green blackberries burnt my mouth.”

We were picking peas in a field behind a member’s farmhouse late one afternoon.  We had just moved to the area and had not had time to plant our own garden, so we were happy to do all the free U-picks our brethren offered.  Nathan, who was only 13 months old, was playing up at the house under the watchful care of the grandmotherly farmwife.  Three year old Lucas wanted to come “help,” so he trailed along behind us, picking a pea pod every so often, but usually exploring.

It took a minute for what he had said to register.  Then, with a knot of fear growing in my stomach, I calmly asked, “What blackberries?  Show me.” 

He led us back about twenty feet, to a place in the fencerow.  Instead of blackberry vines, we saw a four foot high green plant, with spade-shaped leaves and round green berries—nightshade.  We dropped our buckets, pulled the plant, scooped him up, and headed for the nearest emergency room, thirty miles east.  As soon as we arrived, Keith dropped me at the door.  I ran in and practically threw both Lucas and the plant on the registration desk. 

“My baby ate this,” I managed between gasps.

I had found the trick to immediate action in an emergency room.  They ran both him and the plant back behind the swinging doors.  I, of course, was taken to Paperwork Central—they never forget the documentation so they will be paid.  It probably did not help that I had come straight from the field, sweat, dirt, and all, and so did not look particularly solvent.

Two hours later we left with a completely sobered three- year-old, promising us he would never eat green blackberries again.  As far as I know, he hasn’t!

So why are we so much less careful about the poison that sickens our souls?  Spiritual nightshade surrounds us every day of our lives.  Somehow we think we are immune to its effects.  We go places we should not, associate with people we should not, dally with things that are as dangerous as a poisonous snake, and pooh-pooh anyone who dares tell us to be careful.

I am not just talking about things like alcohol and sexual immorality.  Do you realize that wealth in the scriptures is never pictured as anything but dangerous to our souls?  But what do we wish for when the subject of wishes comes up?  And what do we always say?  “I could handle it.  I would never use it the wrong way.  It would never get the best of me.”  What do we tell our young people when they say the same things about drugs and alcohol? 

Arrogance will always get the best of us in all these cases.  Might as well handle a cobra.  Might as well drink some cyanide. 

Might as well eat a pie made of green blackberries.

For [the] rock [of the wicked] is not as our Rock...For their vine is of the vine of Sodom, and of the fields of Gomorrah; their grapes are grapes of gall, their clusters are bitter.  Their wine is the poison of serpents and the cruel venom of asps, Deut 32:31-33.

Dene Ward

I became a mother for the first time on this day in 1977.  It seems only yesterday that two hours after the high forceps delivery of a sunny side up (nurse talk for a posterior birth) nine pound three and a half ounce, twenty-two inch boy the nurse came in, slapped my thigh and said, “Time for a shower!” 

“Are you nuts?”  I remember asking, not too politely. 

Even as big a bundle as he was, he was still too small for those newborn clothes.  They swallowed him whole, but he grew into them quickly. Now he is bigger than I am and could carry me around.

Jesus said we need to become “as little children,” and many suggestions have been made about what He was referring to, from humility, to total dependence, to being easy to forgive.  But when I thought of my son’s birthday, it struck me that there is one thing that children do far better than anyone else.  In fact, they are made for it--they grow, and they grow quickly!

Not too long ago in a women’s Bible study, one sister suggested that the reason we don’t learn too well, the reason we resist deep study and even complain if a class gets past the things we already know is that we think we have arrived.  We are already mature in Christ and there is nothing new to learn.  Never mind that we just heard something new and didn’t know it—it must not be true if we never heard it before!  And it’s asking too much for us to actually act like a student and work at learning—reading scriptures, doing research, filling out workbooks.

I have been blessed beyond measure with the classes I have taught.  The women in them never complain about the difficult lessons, the number of hours they take and the old chestnuts I debunk--there is no gate called the Needle’s Eye!  They eat up everything I give them, write as fast as their fingers can fly, and have even learned to ask me, “How do you know that?”  Good for them!

Do you remember when Paul and Barnabas passed back through the churches of their first journey a second time, appointing elders in every church, Acts 14:21-23?  Those men had only been Christians for about a year.  Yet Paul told Timothy the elder should not be a novice, 1 Tim 3:6.  Would we ever appoint a man to be an elder after only a year?  So what’s the difference today?  Granted they had miraculous gifts back then, but having them and being wise enough to use them properly are two different things—as the Corinthians show us so well; and Paul tells us that having the completed word of God is far superior to spiritual gifts anyway, 1 Cor 12:31; 13:8-12.  The difference is they grew, evidently as fast as children do, while we sit back and complain about the extra effort involved. 

If I were told that I had to pass a certain course to keep my job, do you think I would study hard?  Of course I would.  If I let my driver’s license expire and had to retake the test, would I study hard, even though I probably know most of what is in that manual?  Yes.  I would not want to even take a chance on failing the test.  So where are my priorities?

I don’t know how much time we have to learn and grow, but God says there is a time for each of us: For when by reason of time you ought to be teachers you have reason again that one should teach you…This is a pass/fail test.  What if my time allotment is already past?  I’m not taking the chance.  How about you?

Of whom we have many things to say, hard of interpretation, seeing you have become dull of hearing.  For when by reason of the time you ought to be teachers, you have need again that someone teach you the rudiments of the first principles of the oracles of God, and have become such as need milk, and not of solid food.  For everyone who partakes of milk is without experience of the word of righteousness, for he is a baby.  But solid food is for full grown men, those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern good and evil.  Heb 5:11-14.

Dene Ward

Not long before my first grandchild arrived in this world I told my daughter-in-law, “One day after he is born, maybe a week, maybe a month, and maybe more than once, you are going to sit down and bawl your eyes out.  You won’t know why and you will think, ‘What’s wrong with me?  This is supposed to be the happiest time of my life, and here I am crying.’ 

“There is nothing wrong with you.  You are simply exhausted and overwhelmed.  You have carried a child nine months, you haven’t slept enough, not only since he was born, but for awhile before that because you were so uncomfortable.  You haven’t sat down except to feed him.  Yes, you love him with a ferocity you have never felt before, but he is one demanding little creature, and you will wonder, ‘What in the world was I thinking?’ which only adds to the guilt you feel.  If you don’t suddenly burst into tears a few times, you aren’t normal, and it doesn’t mean you are a bad mother.  In fact, it probably means just the opposite.”

I told her all that because I wished someone had told me when I sat down and burst into tears one afternoon long ago.  We do our brothers and sisters no favors by pretending that life is one big fairy tale.  Instead, we seem to bottle up our own emotions and deny they ever existed, while telling them to “Shape up!”

God put us here to help one another, and it is no help at all to act like we never had these problems.  Babies do not lie down and go to sleep when you need them to.  One word “fitly spoken” will not unravel a tangled conflict.  Sometimes spouses are inconsiderate and unkind and have no interest in talking about the problem and fixing it.  We have lived too long with sitcoms that solve all difficulties in less than thirty minutes and Lifetime movies that depict one intervention mending a twenty year rift in a relationship.  In real life it doesn’t happen that way.

We once spent an hour with a man who thought himself “the dream husband,” trying to get him to see that his actions were nothing more than abusive control.  The hour ended with him in tears, determined to be better.  The next morning he was again blaming his wife for her lack of gratitude for all his “care.”  That is real life.  Problems that took years to develop will not disappear in a minute, or an hour, or even a week. 

Our children learn nothing when we hide our disagreements.  Keith’s parents once said, “We never argue.”  When he was finally old enough to figure things out, he answered, “That’s because you both clammed up and walked away, not because you never got mad at each other.”  Children need to see how to resolve conflicts in a godly manner, or even how to apologize when the manner was less than godly. 

When a young person struggles with sin and we tell him he never truly repented, when someone who is seriously ill becomes depressed and we say, “Where’s your faith?” when another is beset by tragedy and in her grief asks, “Why?” and all we can do is scold, we have failed them.  A brother is born for adversity, Prov 17:17.  When I do not comfort my brother in that adversity, when I am too proud to share the wisdom that has come from mistakes I have made, I have not fulfilled my purpose for being.

It’s time we older Christians stopped endorsing fairy tales.  It’s time we told it like it is.  Life can be hard and it doesn’t necessarily mean you are at fault. Even when you are at fault, it doesn’t mean you are worse than anyone else, no matter what image others try to present.  Older Christians must realistically prepare the younger for life, and comfort them during their trials.  Job said that when we do not comfort those who need it our very relationship with God is in peril, 6:14,15. 

God told Ezekiel, Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel… and say to them…The weak you have not strengthened, the sick you have not healed, the injured you have not bound up, the strayed you have not brought back, the lost you have not sought…therefore you shepherds hear the word of the Lord…I am against the shepherds and I will require my sheep at their hands…Ezek 34:2,4,7,10.  He feels the same way about older Christians who present unrealistic expectations to the younger and then do not comfort and console when difficulties arise.

I must stop pretending I am completely put together so I can help those whose lives are falling apart.

Dene Ward

Someone recently asked me what I thought a kindergarten aged child should know about the Bible.  All I can tell you is from my own experience. 

I believe they should know about God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit—and that all of those beings love him no matter what.  They should know every major Bible story, and be able to name the books of the Bible, the apostles, the sons of Jacob, and the judges.  They should have some major memorizing done, individual verses here and there, and larger passages as well, e.g., the 23rd Psalm, the beatitudes, scriptures like Rom 12:1-3 and good old John 3:16.  And those things should be explained as well as a five or six year old can understand them, which may be more than you think.  They should have a large repertoire of spiritual songs, not just children’s songs, but some of the hymns from the songbook as well.  They should be praying several times a day.

The person who asked looked at me, dumbfounded.  “That’s impossible,” he said.  No.  It’s not.  I could do most of that, and my children could do all of it.  I can still hear five year old Lucas reciting the twenty-third psalm, and three year old Nathan singing all five verses of “Twust and Obey.”

What’s that? “It isn’t about learning facts.”  Of course, it isn’t.  But tell me, which do you teach first, critical analysis of the poetry of Keats versus that of Milton, or memorizing the alphabet?  They will never understand faith till they see it working in the life of Abraham; or courage, until they know the stories of David and Esther; or unselfish devotion until they hear about Ruth gleaning in the field.  Isn’t that why God put those facts there in the first place? …things…written aforetime were written for our learning, (Rom 15:4).

And you know what works even better?  Learning about the generosity of Barnabas and then seeing a father like mine, who gave so generously that the IRS audited him.  And learning about the compassion of Dorcas and then a seeing a mother like mine, who took food off her table to give to a neighbor whose husband was killed in an automobile accident, and then organized a food drive for that same neighbor and her five small children.   

And as to the amount I think a child should know so early?  The problem is not a child’s capacity.  The problem is adults underestimating their capacity. And maybe the problem is we do not want to spend the time it takes to do this.  This is not something you accomplish in 15 minutes a day of “quality time,” that great myth that has been foisted on American parents.  God never expected that meager amount to be the time we spend teaching our children. 

Hear, O Israel:  Jehovah our God is one Jehovah.  And you shall love Jehovah your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and with all your might.  And these words which I command you this day shall be upon your heart; and you shall teach them diligently unto 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 up.  And you shall bind them for a sign upon your hand, and they shall be for frontlets between your eyes, and you shall write them on the doorposts of your house, and upon your gates.  Deut 6:4-9.

I think that pretty well covers it all, don’t you?

Dene Ward

The one and only time I went to the Florida College Summer Camp was when I was 8.  It was held on campus and I had the first floor dorm room in Sutton Hall that looks out toward what I knew later as Upper Division Dorm. 

The last night of camp, when all the parents came to pick us up, the counselors staged a “Bible Bee.”  We all stood in a circle, beginning with the youngest on to the oldest.  Someone asked Bible questions around the circle and if you missed the question you sat down.  After about 30 minutes there were five of us left—me, all alone on the “kiddy” side of the nearly depleted circle, and, on the other side, 4 teenagers who looked as big as adults to me.

I only remember one question.  I was flabbergasted when a 16 year old could not answer, “Who was thrown into the lion’s den?”  The question came to me next, and I actually felt embarrassed for the boy when I answered, “Daniel.”  That was as far as I got.  You would think I would remember the question that did me in, but I don’t.  I do remember that I could hardly comprehend what was being asked, so it must have been a doozy. 

Eventually, one of the older teenagers won the bee, and I could not understand why so many people came up to me saying how impressed they were.  Except for that last question they were all so easy.  You see, it had absolutely nothing to do with me, and everything to do with my parents.

My sister and I were raised knowing the importance of Bible knowledge.  My mother was a first generation Christian and back then did not have the teaching resources I had available when I was raising my children.  But judging by that “bee,” she and my father, who was only second generation himself, did a much better job of teaching than most who had more advantages.  They answered all the questions we asked, helped us when we needed it, and made sure we did our Bible lessons. They bought us a big beautiful Bible story book.  I did not realize then how expensive it was, but now I can look back and appreciate how lavishly they spent on us and why, especially given our un-lavish lifestyle.  They even allowed us to stay up 15 minutes late so we could read it every night, and later our own Bibles, before bed.  That certainly instilled its importance to me.  Because of their diligence, I cannot understand parents who allow their children—no matter how old they are--to get in the car on Sunday morning without checking to see that they have their lesson books and their Bibles, and without making sure the lessons were done the night before. 

Something just as important--I always saw my parents doing their own lessons, whether it involved doing a workbook or reading a passage of scripture.  Their Bibles and class materials always had a special place on the shelf by the carport door.  If it was not there, they were studying, or they were at class.  None of this “I forgot” business.  And they talked about the scriptures on days other than Sunday and Wednesday.  We grew up knowing that you were supposed to think about these things every day.

That is how I did so well at the Summer Camp Bible Bee.  Like I said, it really had nothing at all to do with me.

…having been reminded of the unfeigned faith that is in you, which dwelt first in your grandmother Lois, and in your mother Eunice, and I am persuaded in you also. 2 Tim 1:5

Dene Ward

Too many times we studio teachers teach only the instrument, piano and voice in my case, and neglect the other things that make one a well-rounded musician—history, theory, ear training.  So for my students I made up history notebooks focusing on one particular composer each year containing articles, worksheets, and listening labs.  When the makeup of the studio suddenly increased to 40% voice students, I decided to make a notebook with them in mind, one on opera.  Besides, even piano students needed to know about opera.

I began with worksheets on the history of opera and types of operas.  Then we moved on to study the stories of 5 different operas, followed by a listening lab on one of the more famous arias from each opera.  I live in a rural county.  The closest thing to opera any of these students had ever seen or heard was their grandparents’ reminiscences of Minnie Pearl and the Grand Ol’ Opry.  The answers I received on many of the listening labs often made me laugh out loud and taught me a lot about perspective.

“Nessun dorma” from Turandot:  (All the recordings were in the original language of the opera.)  On the question, “Describe the melody,” a 6 year old wrote, “Sounds Italian to me.”  How could I argue with that?

Another question attempted to point out the emotion in the singers’ voices by asking, “Where in the music do you think he sings, ‘I will win!  I will win!’?”  Though it was in Italian it was obvious; even the 6 year old got it.  But one 10 year old thoroughly misunderstood the question and wrote, “I don’t know, but he was so loud, he MUST have been outside somewhere.”

“La donna mobile” from Rigoletto:  “What are the main difficulties of this aria?”  A 9 year old answered, “He’s trying to get a woman, but can’t.”

We could not have left out Carmen, though presenting this less than moral character to children took a bit of discretion.  We listened to the “Habanera,” which is, in reality, a dance.  “Carmen likes to flirt a lot.  How does the fact that she is singing to a dance make it sound ‘flirty?’”  A 9 year answered, “It shows she’s pretty smart if she can sing a dance!”

Because the majority of my singers were 14-16 year old girls, I chose Charlotte Church’s recording over Maria Callas’s version of Carmen.  Charlotte was only 15 at the time and I felt they could better relate to her.  However, this brought about the question, “How is her ability to sing this character likely to change as she gets older?”  Talk about perspective, a 9 year old boy wrote, “She’ll soon be married and she’d better not be flirting with other men!!!!”  But a 16 year old girl wrote--now remember Charlotte was only 15 on this recording--“It won’t be long till she is so old she won’t even remember how to flirt any more.” 

Was this notebook successful?  When I took up the final exams I wondered.  The first question was “Define opera.”  An 11 year old wrote, “A type of music for men and women where you sing real LOUD.”

But I also had them write, both at the beginning of the study and at the end, what they honestly thought about opera.  One 14 year old was very tactful at the beginning of the year when she wrote, “I think people who can sing it are very talented.”  But at the end of the year she wrote, “If this is opera, I really like it.  And I learned not to ever say I don’t like something when I don’t really know anything about it.”

I wonder how many people approach the Bible that way?  They believe it to be a book of myths, a storybook, only a suggestion for how to live, anything but the Word of God when they have absolutely no personal knowledge on the subject.  They have never considered the evidence; they have never made comparisons to other ancient writings that are far less convincing.  We have only 643 copies of Homer’s Iliad but over 5700 copies of the scriptures, and no one ever questions the completeness and accuracy of that Greek epic.  We believe George Washington existed and became our first president.  Why?  Because of eyewitness accounts, the same type of accounts available in historical documents about Jesus.  Even people who accept Jesus as the Son of God, question the validity of the New Testament because it was a translation, yet Jesus himself quoted a translation of the Old Testament, one about as far removed from him in time as the New Testament is from us, and all this barely skims the surface of internal and external evidences validating the Bible.

My students learned a valuable lesson the year we studied opera:  don’t judge until you check it out yourself.  If you are wondering about the Bible, about Jesus, and even about the existence of a Creator, the only logical and fair thing is for you to do that too.

For the word of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us who are saved it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, And the discernment of the discerning will I bring to nought. Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For seeing that in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom knew not God, it was God's good pleasure through the foolishness of the preaching to save them that believe.                   1 Corinthians 1:18-21

Dene Ward