Update on 4-29-16:
This giveaway has ended.
Thank you to everyone who participated in this giveaway.
Four winners have been randomly selected.
Congratulations to Jessica, Heidi, Cathy and Leti!
You will be receiving an email today.
I AM SO EXCITED ABOUT THIS GIVEAWAY!
I have been on a search for a devotional book that my kids would look forward to reading together. I wanted to find a devotional that would speak into their hearts without going over their heads. It needed to be a book that could fit into our lives and could capture the attention of our 6, 8, and 10 year old children.
I am happy to say that I have finally found a devotional book that can do all those things and my children LOVE ! A while back we did a giveaway for a devotional book that you could do around your dinner table called “One Year of Dinner Table Devotions and Discussion Starters: 365 Opportunities to Grow Closer to God as a Family”. It was/is a great book, but after using it several days it became apparent to me that it was written with older children in mind. My kids did not understand or relate to what I was reading so it was hard for them to sit still and pay attention. I still want to use it someday, just not now, so I put it on our shelf and I plan to pull it back out when my kids are teens. In my search for a devotional for 5 to 10 year olds I found the book we are doing this week as a giveaway this week. The name of the book of our giveaway is, “The One Year Devotions for Kids, Includes Key for Kids– 365 Character-Building Principles”.
Here are few reasons I love this book. . .
It’s Quick.
I love that each daily devotional is quick and easy to read. These devotions that take less than ten minutes to read are great for young kids with a short attention span . Each devotional is just one page. From a practical standpoint, that means you could do the devotional at the dinner table, at bedtime, while you are waiting with the kids for the bus to come, or anytime you find yourself routinely sitting together as a family for a few minutes.
It makes biblical concepts
easy to understand and relate to.
Each devotional is given in a parable type style. Each story involves a child. The story is wrapped up with a message that relates to a biblical principle. Some of Jesus’ best teachings were through parables because he knew we would be able to relate to stories of ordinary people. These are parables kids can relate to. The Bible gives this instruction to parents:
Deuteronomy 6:6-9 These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. 7 Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. 8 Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. 9 Write them on the door frames of your houses and on your gates.
The concept of teaching your children the truths of the Bible and weaving them in and out of every day life is beautiful, but it can also be daunting, especially if a parent is new to the faith and doesn’t know many verses yet. Each devotion sets up a scenario that could be a real-life scenario and then ties it to a verse or two, in a way that 5-11 year olds can understand and connect to.
It’s written in a format that is easy to follow.
Kids can help read the devotions and the different parts can be read by more than one child. The format looks like this:
- Scripture reference that can be read from the Bible.
- Story/devotional thought.
- Very brief question/application.
- Memory verse.
This type of format makes it easy for us to assign a part to each child. For instance, our eight year old can read the scripture from the Bible, then our ten year old can read the devotional and application, and our six year old can read the memory verse. We haven’t made a big deal about memorizing each verse but we do read the verse each time. One night we passed the book around and everyone took a turn reading the memory verse to make it easier to remember.
Having a predictable format helps children with short attention spans because they know where they are at in the process of the devotion. It’s a lot easier for kids to pay attention when they know it is only going to be for two more minutes.
It creates opportunities to
speak truth into our children’s lives.
When our oldest son turned nine years old last year it dawned on me and my husband that if he leaves the house around the age of 18 (like we assume he probably will, for college) then that means we have reached our half-way mark. I understand that our time under the same roof is limited. At some point we do hope that our children will live an independent, confident, meaningful life that they can be proud of (outside of our house). This is the time God has given us to pour into our children on a daily basis until they are ready to fly the coop. Of course, we will always be there for them, but this is the time that they are sort of stuck with us which makes it an easy time to pour into them. The training and teaching that take place now will have eternal value.
It teaches kids the importance of
daily getting into God’s word.
Proverbs 22:6 Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.
This devotional book gives you one whole year of daily devotions to do with your kids!
What habits and values do you want to instill in your children?
Is daily getting into the Bible important to you or them?
What will your kids know at the end of this year that they did not know at the beginning of the year?
How will they grow and what part do you have in that?
This devotional makes it easy for a parent to be intentional about pouring into their children’s hearts and minds. Besides getting them in the Bible, it also instills important values and principles that will help them both now and in the future.
Each nugget of truth you share with your kids is like a seed being planted. Plant seeds in your children now while you have them in your home. The seeds that are planted today will reap a harvest over time. One of the greatest joys of parenting is when you get to see the seeds that were planted in past years begin to take root in your children’s hearts and minds and then watching God grow a harvest of righteousness as they mature in their faith.
One last thing that I loved:
The back of the book.
The other day I was talking with my daughter about what her favorite verse was. In the discussion she brought up a song we did that tied to a memory verse over the summer a couple of summers ago. We played the song each day as we tried to memorize the verse and she, even a couple of years later, could still sing the verse to me. I asked her what the verse meant to her. She had a quick answer that did prove that she understood what the verse was trying to say, but I felt like it would be good to talk more about the verse. I flipped to the back of this devotional book and I looked up the verse. I was pleased to see that there was a page in the book that used that verse as a memory verse. I flipped to the page and we read the devotional that went along with that verse and then we discussed what we read. I love that this book is a resource that I can turn to when I want to try to help my kids make some sense out of verse.
What do you think? Would this devotional be a good fit for your family? If it would then I have good news for you. . .
We have four copies to give away!!!
Isn’t that awesome? When I asked the Tyndale House publishers if we could do a giveaway for this book they sent me five copies. One for myself and four to give away to our readers!
I am excited to get these into the hands of families who could use them.
Signing up for this giveaway is easy. To sign up for this giveaway just answer one question using our giveaway tool below. You can come back and answer once a day until the giveaway ends on April 29 at 12:00 p.m. to increase your chances of winning.
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