Getting Back on Board

image: lds.org

As I waited for #2 during his choir practice last night, I came across the "Mother Education" manual that I remember my mom talking about when I was a child. I don't know when it was published, but it does quote Ezra Taft Benson as late as 1987, so it was last published during my lifetime.

I read the first chapter and am currently reading the second.

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As I'm reading it, it's bringing back some pretty funny memories of when and how our family started implementing family scripture study. I think I'm realizing that sometimes you just have to do what you have to do to get where you need to be.

Hearing so often that family scripture study would be a good thing to do, I thought over all of the obstacles that would prevent us from doing it and set about to find ways to resolve them all. I knew there had to be a way to overcome them.


*The first obstacle was time....

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With kids running everywhere, it's tough to come up with a time that works when everyone is home.
We decided that early in the morning was best, so we opted for 6:15am.

*The second was resources.....

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We give our kids their own serious set of scriptures when they are baptized, but we weren't sure that we had enough copies of the Book of Mormon just laying around that the littler kids'd have a book to read from.
I went and purchased a hardbound, less expensive copy for each member of the family and had their first name embossed on it. They went into a basket in the front room.

*The third was buy in....

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We wanted everyone to have something vested in this venture. We thought if we could pull them each on board, we'd all be more excited about being together for scripture study.
We decided to have a different child host scripture study in his/her bedroom each day. This way, his/her bedroom had to be clean and he/she was responsible for gathering everyone together and making sure there was a piece of floor or bed for everyone to sit on. He/she was also supposed to bring the scripture basket to the bedroom for reading.

*The fourth was enthusiasm....

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This one makes me laugh now, but whenever you go to an LDS activity, there are always refreshments. I thought that if we had something yummy to offer them, the kids'd come more readily.....and they did. This was the best part. The host/hostess got to choose what everyone ate while we studied. I would go and buy special things we didn't normally have in our home--granola bars, poptarts, muffins, etc. Of course this wasn't the best scenario--eating in someone's bedroom--but it kept everybody coming, and that was the most important thing; sometimes you have to choose.


My hope was that the refreshments could be eliminated in time, and they were. The kids continued to come because it became a habit for our family. As kids' school schedules have changed, we've had to flex. As it stands now, I have an alarm that goes off every evening at 6:30 to alert us that it's time for scriptures. Sometimes we heed it; sometimes we don't.

Looks like it's time to analyze the obstacles again. Maybe it's time to buy some pop tarts.