"Out of the mouth of babes..."

(and almost-3-year-olds!)

Our pastor has been encouraging us and working with us as a church on memorizing the following passage from the prophecy of Habakkuk:

Though the fig tree should not blossom

And there be no fruit on the vines,

Though the yield of the olive should fail

And the fields produce no food,

Though the flock should be cut off from the fold

And there be no cattle in the stalls,

Yet I will exult in the LORD,

I will rejoice in the God of my salvation.

The Lord GOD is my strength,

And He has made my feet like hinds' feet,

And makes me walk on my high places.

(Habakkuk 3:16-19)

On a Wednesday evening about a month ago, our pastor asked if anyone had come up with any creative ideas as memory aids, etc. It occurred to me to try to get Elizabeth to start memorizing the passage by making a rebus, with picture cues for key words, etc. Well, I haven't gotten that far yet... But I have started quoting parts of the passage to her while we're driving – partly as an effort to "redeem the time" on my part.

On the way to "school" yesterday, we again worked on the passage. But instead of quoting the entire passage, I started with: “The LORD God is my strength.” I paused to see if Elizabeth could supply the last word. I forget what she said but since she didn’t get it right, she got a little frustrated. (She already tends to be a perfectionist – very intense!) But I moved on to the previous phrase anyway: “I will rejoice in the God of my…” and she said: /vation/ (The last time I’d worked with her on the passage was sometime last week!) After repeating those two phrases multiple times, I added the phrase previous to them: “I will exult in the LORD.” I repeated all three phrases, stopping for her to complete the last two with “salvation” and “strength” – and since she had been successful in remembering /vation/ and since she was being successful in consistently completing the two phrases, she was very excited (doing her little shivers of joy, little giggle, etc.) As we were approaching Piney Mountain Rd., I finished going through the three phrases and paused, concentrating on traffic, etc. A little voice from the back seat said: “...my high places…” Precious little memory! We hadn't even said those verses since last week sometime. So we added the end of the passage. She was very, very excited – enjoying her successes! And then last night, working on the passage with Daddy, she completed the entire last line of one of the verses. (If I'm remembering correctly, it was: "...the God of my salvation.")

I am both rebuked and encouraged by the privilege and responsibility that is mine as a Christian parent and teacher – to redeem the time and teach my child to memorize the Word of God. (And it makes me have to work harder at memorizing, too – I'm finding that it's not as easy as it used to be!)