Katie and I are doing a 5 minute a day Bible Reading program that covers the New Testament in a year. A few weeks ago, since she has been wanting to do the readings by herself, I decided to add on an accountability factor. Now when we do our readings we have to highlight at least one thing from each chapter that either 1) we can apply to our own lives, 2) we don't fully understand or 3) just our favorite part of the chapter.
We've been doing this for a couple weeks now and I've learned something. I've always asked Katie if understood what she read and she's always said yes - with a few exceptions. But I've always wondered because I know there are times when I will read something and not fully understand it. Over the course of this week, however, while Katie has been explaining certain Bible passages to me I've realized that now only does she "get it" but I think there are times when she may "get it" better than I do.
Both examples I have are from Luke since that is the book we're currently reading. Why Jesus would not allow demons to say who he was came up in conversation. Now, I've actually researched this before and have read that the timing wasn't right, He did not want a creature that was known to lie to be telling people who He was, that he wanted to show that the had conquered the demon and not have it look like he had made some kind of agreement with them. When Katie brought this up her reasoning was that if everyone heard the demons proclaiming that this was the Son of God then everyone would believe it and he wouldn't have been crucified and died for us. On this point I think she was off, BUT I loved to see how her mind worked.
The second example is almost embarrassing for me to admit. We both had the parable of the barren fig tree (Luke 13:6-9) highlighted, but for different reasons.
Here are the verses:
Parable of the Barren Fig Tree
6 Then Jesus told this story: “A
man planted a fig tree in his garden and came again and again to see if
there was any fruit on it, but he was always disappointed. 7 Finally,
he said to his gardener, ‘I’ve waited three years, and there hasn’t
been a single fig! Cut it down. It’s just taking up space in the
garden.’
8 “The
gardener answered, ‘Sir, give it one more chance. Leave it another
year, and I’ll give it special attention and plenty of fertilizer. 9 If we get figs next year, fine. If not, then you can cut it down.’”
My note said to look this up in a commentary. She had highlighted it as something we can remember for our own lives. I had forgotten to look it up before our conversation, so the fact that she had it highlighted - and for that reason - made me stop in my tracks and pull out paper and pen. She explained to me that the man who planted the fig tree was God, the fig tree was us and the gardener was Jesus. The fig tree not producing fruit is our sin because when we obey God we produce good fruit. At this point I looked at my daughter and thought to myself "Well, duh. How did I not see that?" There's a reason that Christ said
"I tell you the truth, unless you turn from your sins and become like little children, you will never get into the Kingdom of Heaven." Matthew 18:3 Katie keeps proving this to me and I hope its something that will continue on throughout her life.
By the way, I did double check the Parable of the Barren Fig Tree in a commentary and with the exception of the fig tree being Israel - which if you apply the verse to our times IS us - she was spot on.
