Our Little Preacher

All three of our children are avid readers, but reading the Bible for pleasure has not ever been on their 8 year old radar. Like many adults, they prefer books about the Bible that break it down, illustrate it, cull through to the 'main stories,' highlight the takeaway points and make Scripture easier to read.

To encourage them to read actual Scripture, my Mother-in-law, Carol, offered to pay our trio $5 for each book of the Bible they read. As I mentioned in my recent post about allowances, neither K nor P are particularly motivated by money. But R is a completely different story. He has earned $25 to spend at the school book fair in the last 48 hours.

To make sure they are reading for comprehension not just for the monetary reward, I added another requirement--a brief video synopsis I can send to Carol.

I cannot tell you how it has blessed my heart to see R so eager to sit in the kitchen each morning and read the Word--but his video reports have been the real treat. I shoot them on my phone in one take with no coaching or rehearsal..so there is plenty of stumbling and rabbit trails, but, oh, the sweetness!

Here's yesterday morning's report on Jude. (Because like any good little capitalist, he is reading the shortest books first. :)


His exegesis is far from perfect, but not bad for an 8 year old on the fly.

And I am not the only one enjoying them. A friend of mine teased she is now using them as her quiet time. :)