It’s almost the watermelon time of year in the deep south. You have just enough time to study through this book with your littles (and biggers, too) before you make all the applications at the end using the the ripe watermelon from your garden or market. I really tried to make this book count for something important in the lives of my grandchildren. I wanted its message about choosing wisely to go deep into their souls, especially when it comes the time for their choosing the spouses who will walk through life with them and who will very likely influence their eternal destinies. That’s just about the heaviest and most important “stuff” I can think of to be included in a book for kids, yet I still wanted it to be fun and memorable for them. I hope it is that.
But I also wanted to make it helpful for parents who want to spend daily time in the Word with their kids, but who never really had Family Bible Time modeled for them as they grew up. Lots of parents today tell me that they want to make this a daily ritual in their homes, but they just don’t know how. Picking Melons and Mates has a 21-day Family Bible Time guide to get you started–a simple plan for Bible time every day for three weeks. At the end of three weeks, you will be in the FBT habit and you will know how to continue on your own. I also tried to include something for kids from about age three or four all the way up into the teen years. I know that lots of you already are doing a much better and more creative job of FBT than I could ever have done. For you, I hope it’s just another useful little tool.
It made my day recently to be tagged in a post from a dear family in Michigan, as they were doing one of the most fun parts of the Picking Melons experience. Here they are. This is (L-R) Joel, Amos and Malachi Richardson.
They made me smile. I think God smiles, too, on parents who are diligently preparing children for choices that will make heaven a reality for them one day. If those who cause little people to stumble would be better off with a millstone around their necks and thrown into the sea (Matthew 18:6), then surely moms, like Brittany Richardson, who are doing all they can to prevent that stumbling will find a converse reward. I think that’s what I Timothy 2:15 is all about. I believe it’s surely also one of the ways we “receive one of these little ones” in the name of Jesus. This reward of receiving Jesus is specifically mentioned as the converse of causing the little ones to stumble in Matthew 18:5. When we do that (receive the little ones), we receive the Lord, Himself. As parents and grandparents, are we receiving the Lord?
Picking Melons, of course, is just one tiny tool to help our kids make choices toward the throne for eternity. But whatever the chosen building tools, the Word is the foundation and source of all wisdom for decision making. We’ve got to be in the Word with our kids!
