Life with River the Peacemaker is about to get interesting. In March, he turned 1, and for this past year, he has been your typical baby. Much of his life up to this point has consisted of eating, sleeping and getting changed. Now he is crawling with the best of them and beginning to build a vocabulary. He can say, “Bubba” for his brothers, “Da-da” and “Ma-ma.” He can also say, “Poppy,” though for some reason, I am the only one who can make it out.
But the word River uses most often is “car.” When the weather is nice, Titus the Honorable and Cohen the Goodhearted ask permission to ride their bicycle and scooter out in the street. Although the street they live on is not a terribly busy one, they cannot ride without one or more of their parents supervising. Many nights, you will see Caleb and Adrian sitting in lawn chairs at the end of the driveway, one of them holding River, watching as the other two ride their bicycles up and the down the street.
When a car approaches, one of the parents yells, “CAR! Here comes a CAR!” They yell loud enough so the boys can hear and safely pull over to the side, letting the car pass by.
After several evenings of this, River began to connect the sight of a car with the word itself. He says it with the same intensity his parents do. He was at our house the other day, and we were standing on the front porch when a car came driving by. River started yelling, “CAR! CAR! CAR!”
If River is in his car seat and a car pulls up alongside, he again starts yelling, “CAR!” He doesn’t know the word “car”; all he knows is “CAR!”
It is funny how a child can pick up on words. From watching his parents, River has learned to warn his brother of possible danger.
Recently, Titus the Honorable has been wanting to earn money. A friend of mine who has now gone home to be with the Lord had a contract with his two grandchildren, giving them a dollar for each Bible verse they memorized. Each of his grandchildren could quote 100 Bible verses. None of these came from the 11 shortest verses in the Bible:
- “Jesus wept” (John 11:35).
- “Rejoice always” (1 Thessalonians 5:16).
- “Pray continually” (1 Thessalonians 5:17).
- “Remember Lot’s wife” (Luke 17:32).
- “Despise not prophesyings” (1 Thessalonians 5:20, KJV).
- “You shall not murder” (Exodus 20:13, NIV).
- “You shall not steal” (Exodus 20:15).
- “You shall not murder” (Deuteronomy 5:17).
- “You shall not steal” (Deuteronomy 5:19).
- “Quench not the spirit” (1 Thessalonians 5:19, KJV).
- “Brethren, pray for us” (1 Thessalonians 5:25. KJV).
So far, Titus the Honorable has earned $3 and memorized some significant Scriptures. It has been fun watching him as he FaceTimes me and stands at attention to quote his latest memory verse. To get his dollar, he must quote them in front of me.
Helping your children memorize Scriptures should be one of your top priorities. Most of the verses that you can quote, you probably learned when you were a child. You may notice that out of the 11 shortest verses in the Bible, four have to do with the Ten Commandments. The Ten Commandments are the “CAR!” verse of the Bible. They give a child wisdom and a warning.
Here are five reasons you need to have your children memorize The Ten Commandments:
- They were important to Jesus, and He taught from them. “I have kept my Father’s commands” (John 15:10b).
- As parents, we are commanded to teach them. Moses told the Israelites, “ Remember the day you stood before the LORD your God at Horeb, when he said to me, ‘Assemble the people before me to hear my words so that they may learn to revere me as long as they live in the land and may teach them to their children’” (Deuteronomy 4:10).
- The Ten Commandments serve as a good place to start teaching your child to love Jesus. “If you love me, keep my commands” (John 14:15).
- The Ten Commandments will keep your child from sin. “I have hidden your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you” (Psalm 119:11).
- The Ten Commandments were so important to God that this is the only portion of the Bible that He wrote personally: ”The Lord gave me two stone tablets inscribed by the finger of God” (Deuteronomy 9:10a).
Do you know why Moses had to climb Mount Sinai to receive the 10 Commandments from God? They were stored in the cloud and had to be downloaded. Download them into your children today.
CAR!