Last Sunday was my last Sunday teaching the children’s Bible class for a while — yep…new year, new quarter, new teacher…all I can say is, bless her heart! 😂❤️😇😇😇❤️😂
Don’t get me wrong — I love those little Bible students to death, but I’ve always said teaching kids has to be more difficult than teaching adults.
You see, adults know a lot of things already…and the things they don’t know, they’re usually too embarrassed to ask, so they’ll just Google it…but kids?? They just use YOU as their own personal Google! 😂
Yep, there’s no shame in their game!! 😂 And for the past 16 weeks, these little elementary schoolers have been coming outta left field every Sunday with their questions about God and life and death and the universe…and I’m just over here like, Jesus help me through another Sunday…🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏😂😂😂
I kid, I kid…mostly. 😉
The truth is they ask great questions…I just don’t always have great answers for them…🫠😩🤔.
But I guess that’s the beauty of it all — as the students learn, I learn, too. It’s truly a humbling experience.
But it always leads me to wonder…when it comes to the scriptures, at this stage in life, DOES God expect me to “know it all?”
😳😳😳😳😳😳😳😳
And for some reason, when I was thinking about this, the name Ken Jennings popped into my mind. Remember him? The guy who holds the record for the longest consecutive winning streak on Jeopardy!? 🤓🤓🤓
He’s obviously someone with a lot of knowledge, albeit useless🙄…but that’s beside the point.
My point is, even after 74 consecutive wins (😱), even he was finally stumped!
Ken: Alex, I’ll take Psalm 23 for $100, please.
Alex: The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want, He makes me lie down in these grassy plains where sheep love to graze.
Ken: (*Buzzzzzz*) What is…a meadow?
Alex: No. I’m sorry, the correct answer was actually green pastures.
😂😂😂😂
Okay, okay…that’s NOT the actual question that put Ken “out to pasture” so-to-speak (no pun intended 😂)…but I would feel a lot better about my own Bible knowledge if it were…😂
But is that what God wants from us? A Ken Jennings-level of Bible knowledge? 74 consecutive wins at Bible trivia?
Or does God desire that we give Him more than just a Jeopardy-style regurgitation of Bible facts?? 🤓🤔
That kind of knowledge lives in the mind, but God wants to live in our hearts and souls as well (Matthew 22:37).
In other words, God wants you and I to do more than just quote a scripture about a Shepherd — He wants us to know the Shepherd Himself, Jesus Christ…and he wants to make us one of his sheep, so that we too can lie down in green…meadows.
- God doesn’t want us to just memorize…he wants us to meditate.
- He doesn’t want our orations…He wants our obedience.
- He doesn’t just want us to learn…he wants us to love (knowledge puffs up, love builds up! I Corinthians 8:1).
David, a man after God’s own heart knew a little something about this…Psalm 119:97-105 says:
“Oh, how I love Your law! All day long it is my meditation. Your commandments make me wiser than my enemies, for they are always with me.
I have more insight than all my teachers, for Your testimonies are my meditation. I discern more than the elders, for I obey Your precepts.
I have kept my feet from every evil path, that I may keep Your word. I have not departed from Your ordinances, for You Yourself have taught me.
How sweet are Your words to my taste—sweeter than honey in my mouth! I gain understanding from Your precepts; therefore I hate every false way.
Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.”
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No, I’ll probably never know it all…but I’m going to keep learning, loving, meditating, and obeying God’s Word, because it’s the only way to know Him.
After all, sometimes it’s not what you know, but who you know that counts…especially when it comes to Jesus.
Until next time…
-PWAP