off the shelf
Monday, 13 September 2010 22:45
April 2012
Reading to Your Children
Reading together is important for the development of any child - how much more so for the Christian family whose source of spiritual truth is a Book! Just as talking to your child helps him learn to talk, sharing books develops a love of books and helps him get ready to read. In fact, research has consistently demonstrated that school success is directly correlated with the amount of time the child was read to before the age of four!
Parenting is greatly enhanced by reading together as well, and the togetherness strengthens parent-child bonding, provides comfort for a sick child, and helps maintain communication during the tough times in your relationship. Good books stimulate imagination, build character, and encourage social and emotional development. Good Christian books teach children about God and their place in his kingdom.
Reading is also a wonderful way to share some quiet and loving time with your children. Reading 
together is active, interactive, and stimulating in ways totally lacking in even the best of technology screentime. It is also self-pacing, allowing time to ponder, imagine, and share.
Explore the children's books in our church library this week, and get ready for good times of growth and fun together. To find the children's books in the new library (fuel room), walk into the middle of the room and turn left.
January 2012
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly. - Colossians 3:16
Every January, when we're all thinking of resolutions for the new year, we need to think about how we will read the Bible this year, in random bits, systematically, or deeply. Many of you have participated in the read-through-the-Bible projects of the last three years, so this time I want to challenge you to a new and rewarding experience - memorizing scripture. Don't leave - you can do this!
I have never been good at memorizing, but have found that my slowness gives me the opportunity to meditate deeply on God's Word, so that what I lack in quantity I make up for in understanding. Passages I've memorized regularly find their way into my thoughts and prayers, not necessarily whole passages or word-for-word, but in deeply life-molding ways.
Most important: go at your own pace and in amounts you can easily handle. For several years, 
I have used my adaptation of the system given in the little booklet "Mindful of the Truth" (220.6 HAYDEN) and I highly recommend it to you. You can make an amazing amount of progress in just a couple of minutes a day. I do it at breakfast (I eat alone), but you can also do this as a family, and don't think your kids are too young or too old to do this together.
Start with a short passage, maybe 1-2 verses, that has been meaningful to you, and write it on a 3X5 card. Write just one phrase per line, like poetry, as this will help you memorize. Each day read it through, beginning with the book/chapter/verse reference. Then go back to the first phrase, read aloud a couple of times, then repeat without looking. Work with as few words as necessary to be able to repeat it back a couple of times. Each day as you learn, you can add another phrase.
When you can easily say the whole passage (give yourself a week or two) you are ready to set up your ‘system'. Get 8 more 3X5 cards and label one card each:
Mon/Wed/Fri
Tues/Thurs
Saturday
1st Sunday
2nd Sunday
3rd Sunday
4th Sunday
Keep your new ‘every day' verse on top. Then, when you are ready to move it to the Mon/Wed/Fri section, you can start a new one. There is no time requirement for when a card is to be shifted; this is self-pacing, and as you can see, it allows you to review what you are learning, but at longer intervals as you go, moving from every day to 3 times a week, to 2 times a week, to weekly, to monthly, by which time you should be getting it into your long-term memory. If cards begin to pile up, take a break from adding new verses, and if you find your memory faltering, you can always shift a card back to a previous section, i.e. from Saturday to Tues/Thurs, or even to Mon/Wed/Fri. Remember, this isn't a race!
When you want to memorize a long passage or a whole Psalm, you will want to divide it into short sections, using several cards, and putting the book/chapter/verse reference at the top of each card.
I would love to hear from any of you about your experience with this, or suggestions from your own memorizing system. Email me at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
November 2011
Give Them Heroes
Who do your children admire? Are their aspirations aimed toward a sports hero, a rock star, or a celebrity from TV or movies? Our children need better heroes than these, and you can raise their sights by encouraging them to read biographies of men and women who have lived lives of faithfulness to God.
John Piper has wisely advised us, "Hebrews 11 is a divine mandate to read Christian biography. The unmistakable implication of the chapter is that, if we hear about the faith of our forefathers (and mothers), we will "lay aside every weight and sin" and "run with perseverance the race that is set before us" (12:1). If we asked the author, "How shall we stir one another up to love and good works?" (10:24), his answer would be: "Through encouragement from the living (10:25) and the dead" (chap. 11). Christian biography is the means by which "body life" cuts across the generations.
"Good biography is history and guards us against chronological snobbery (as C. S. Lewis calls it). It is also theology-the most powerful kind-because it burst forth from the lives of people like us. It is also adventure and suspense, for which we have a natural hunger. It is psychology and personal experience, which deepen our understanding of human nature (especially ourselves). Good biographies of great Christians make for remarkably efficient reading".
To find children's books in the new library, walk in toward the middle of the room and bear left to the shelves along the wall. You can select books geared specifically for your own children's ages. The books on the "Middle School" shelves are well-enough written for teens and adults looking for a quick read.
August 2011
Why Read to Your Children?
The immense value of reading to your children has been well established in research. In fact, a positive correlation has been consistently found between a child's success in school and the amount of time the child was read to before the age of four! The point isn't that you are teaching your child to read, but rather, that you are introducing him to the pleasure of books. Reading together is active, interactive, and stimulating in ways totally lacking in even the best of television and videos. It is also self-pacing, allowing time to ponder, imagine, and share.
But for parents, reading to your children provides many more benefits, and those extend well into adolescence. Reading together is not only a wonderful way to share some quiet and loving time with your children, but also it strengthens parent-child bonding, builds character, stimulates imagination, encourages emotional and social development, provides comfort for a sick child, and maintains parent-child communication during the tough times in your relationship. Wow! What more could you ask from something so simple and easy?
For the Christian family, these benefits extend to promoting spiritual growth. Come into the library for a suggested book list for various ages. You can then progress to reading the Bible together, and exploring the many nonfiction books we have in the library for kids of all ages.
July 2011
Marriage: harder, but better, than we might have hoped
So many books on marriage focus on psychology and communication techniques, as if that will solve all our problems and let us live happily ever after. This month I want to recommend some recent library additions that take a more realistic and biblical, approach.
NOTE: audio CD
When Sinners Say "I Do": Discovering the Power of the Gospel for Marriage (CD 249.2 HARVEY) This is the unabridged audio version of the book by Dave Harvey, so you can put it in your car and listen every day on the way to work. Honest and practical, it offers a biblical diagnosis of marital strife, and then demonstrates the life-transforming power of the gospel for two people building a marriage together.
Unclaimed Baggage: Dealing with the Past on Your Way to a Stronger Marriage (249.2 FRANK) Your spouse questions your money management, and you hit the ceiling. Or, conflict sends you running for cover. Or, your in-laws seem to have a hand in every decision you make as a couple. What's going on here? Very likely, you and your mate have brought baggage into your marriage from your past.
TWO FOR NEWLYWEDS: Short, light-hearted and eminently practical, these lay out many of the day-to-day implications of biblical teaching for marriage. Find these on the New Books shelf!
Put the Seat Down (for the guys) Chapters include: She thinks you're still dating; Shut up and talk; It may be your castle, but it's her nest; and How many in-laws does it take to change a lightbulb?
He's Not a Mind Reader (for the gals) Chapters include: The big hairy man; He's not your dad, you're not his mom; I'm his what?! and Hang in there, it's a process.
What Did You Expect??: Redeeming the Realities of Marriage, by Paul David Tripp (249.2 TRIPP)
The author writes, "More couples than I can number have been surprised that their marriage needs the regular rescue of grace. And because they did not take the Bible seriously, they were caught short in that moment, when the rubber meets the road in daily life, where grace was their only hope." (from Chapter 1)