he's been having us read him this story once a night for the last week or two.
he has never done this before even a little bit with any of the other stories that he goes on kicks of reading every night.
jesse said he did it twice as long the first time before he called me in to witness/video.
holy farking bananas! now i know i might be getting ahead of myself thinking we have a little prophet or bible scholar on our hands (after all, it is the most exciting and kid-friendly story in the whole bible and it's understandable that a little boy would love this one).
it might seem cheesy, but since we were pregnant with judah we have prayed that we would have the word of god written on his heart. that he would know scripture and have it at his fingertips all the time. i didnt do a lot of bible study or reading as a kid and as a result, i dont have hardly any scripture memorized, and doing so as a crusty old-brained adult is HARD. jesse, however, did lots of scripture memorization as a kid and the man is an amazing reference. he just knows so much scripture word for word because it was laid down in his mind as a kid when those learning faculties were still sharp and active.
ever since seeing the FASCINATING jesus camp, i have been wary of the line between raising our kids up to be christ-like in age-appropriate ways, and indoctrinating them. we believe very strongly that the bible is the word of god, so we feel that instilling that in them (and not some of the scary extra-biblical [as in outside of the bible] conclusions some of the folks in that movie were drawing and teaching their kids) is not only our duty as parents, but is also something special and magical that will be honored and used by jesus for good no matter what.
since it is more than just memorizing words the way you would your favorite song or movie, and is instead taking the word of the almighty god into your mind, it has power beyond where jesse and i may fall short as christ-modelling parents, and even beyond the sins that our kids will inevitably commit and the ways they will stray from their savior.
the word was with god and the word was god from the beginning of time, soooooooo, we'd be dumb not to make it a huge part of their lives....right? if we say we want our kids to have the hearts and minds of jesus, then this seems like a foolproof way to start and something that cannot be left out.
that's my little aside. yes, we do plan to memorize scripture with the kids from a young age. no, this was not an instance of that. but it was proof that a young brain is amazing and that hopefully instilling a love of the bible from an early age is possible.
also it was mother flipping adorable and entertaining.