No matter how your school year has started or is starting, hybrid or virtual, brick and mortar, or home school, one thing is sure: our homes need Jesus. The responsibility to steep our children in God’s word has never been the job of the church, it’s the job of the parent. The church is a beautiful body of support, but teaching our children is the privilege of parents.
With all of this in mind, I pick verses for our family for every month of the school year. Yes, that’s right, only one a month. We memorize the verse as a family over the course of the month, but it’s more than that. We could memorize a verse a week, but this is not just memorization; it’s meditation.
Meditate on these verses, that means more than just memorizing, it means talking through them, praying them together, reading them in context, and sharing them with others. The verses unfold into the fabric of our days. We don’t just memorize the words, we find ways to pray and apply them.
Here are some examples of how we use them. First, it gets written on the chalkboard, if you don’t have one, write it on the fridge, a message board, or somewhere central in your home. Read the verses in context together, sometimes even the whole chapter (Having the kids read to each other out loud promotes more discussion. This is even a great step to do over a couple of weeknight dinners.) We love to read it out of the Message translation. I also have each of them find and highlight the verse in their own Bibles.
Each child in my family writes the verse in their journals. Journaling prayer is a great thing to teach your children early. It helps them learn to direct their feelings to God and articulate them well. Once they have written the verse itself, they turn it into a prayer. I’ve given an example of this with one of our verses at the bottom. This is a really cool step for artistic children. They can even draw or illustrate the verse. If you have children who are too young to write the verse, have them copy it, you can even find a coloring sheet on Pinterest. My children love to remind their Father to write the verse in his journal, and they love quizzing both of us. Like I said, this is a family plan, not just for the kids, but something for you to share.
No matter what you do, you have a whole month, you can take it slow and really let these verses become a part of your year. There is something beautiful about a slow steady gaze on scripture. It corrects my gaze and helps me refocus. It’s very different from glancing at scripture.
Even if you don’t have children, I encourage you to do this with your spouse or even a friend. Use the resource however you want, switch some of the verses out with a verse that God has been highlighting in your life. Just don’t miss this opportunity to implant God’s word in the hearts of your family. Once it’s in their hearts, God can use it in their lives even when you aren’t there to remind them of the truth. The word of God is living and active (Hebrews 4:12).
You can click on the link below for a printable PDF of the verses we will be using from September through May.