Bible Quizzing is Back and Saying No to a Critical Spirit

Yesterday was exciting as Bible Quizzing started up again and with a vengeance.  The last couple of years have not been so good.  I can never understand that.  I see the value of memorizing God's Word as so critical, but for some reason not everyone else does so we don't get a good turn out no matter how many families I invite, but this year was different.  So many people showed up!  We have at least 15 junior quizzers and more senior quizzers than we've ever had.  It was sooooo encouraging.  

My younger boys had spent the last two weeks memorizing and were doing really well and then in the last few days, I swear, a demon from hell had been sent to them just to make them see it as pointless and stressful.  I really can't explain their sudden change in behaviour except that they were seen as a threat to the kingdom of darkness so they went from "I'm memorizing!" to "I'm dropping out" in one day.  I told them to keep at it and so they did, but not without constant bugging from me.

Then yesterday, they were the ones getting all the jumps and quoting all the correct answers.  It all made sense to them and myself as we reflected on the practice after everyone left.  They were so excited again and they were keen to keep memorizing.  What had happened earlier on in the week was clearly a spiritual battle to discourage them and attempt to keep them from memorizing.  There isn't a week when some kind of battle takes place.

This week I found myself unknowingly being the one who was critical or snippy.  The irony is I'm mentoring these younger moms and yet I was falling into the very trap I was discouraging them to avoid particularly with their husbands.  Seeing how that was not what I wanted to keep doing, I was suddenly keenly aware of every word that came out of my mouth.  I often say this to the kids as my mom used to say to me, "If you can't say anything nice then don't say anything at all", but had I ever really thought about EVERY word?  

This week that's what I have found myself doing.  I have literally thought through EVERY word.  Knowing I can cause tremendous discouragement and how criticism is never received well, I just quit cold turkey.  If a thought comes into my mind that is critical, then I just don't talk.  I catch myself and turn it around into something I'm grateful for.  If I find myself worrying, I realize how I discuss my concerns can then turn into a form of disrespect as I end up questioning RM on what decisions he's making or what he's doing, so now I just stop.  I try to discuss it very carefully as I'm uber aware now of how it makes him feel.  I've never  had this level of sensitivity before, but as we talked through a few things this week, he made it very clear how the criticism is hard for him and so I just stopped.  I don't plan on adding it back into my life!  Even though I've worked on this before and have seen major differences in our marriage, I realize I can still grow, still improve and why not, I plan on being married a lot longer, so I'd like to make it go the distance!

Well, I'm off to drive a son to school and start another day.....