Here’s an easy way you and your kids can remember what God has done–on purpose! Build an altar! (I did this with our daughter and now you can, too!)
To celebrate starting high school and to give thanks for the amazing things God did all through elementary and middle school in moving mountains, answering prayers, and literally saving our lives, we had a Joshua 4 moment this week and made an altar of remembrance. That’s what the Israelites did after their miraculous crossing of the Jordan River . . . “In the future, when your children ask you, ‘What do these stones mean?’ tell them that the flow of the Jordan was cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord. . . . These stones are to be a memorial to the people of Israel forever.”
We went out to the woods armed with our Bibles and our magic markers, We found it easier to find 12 sticks than 12 large rocks, so we gathered them, set them aside, then read Joshua, chapters 3 and 4 aloud. Then we thought of 12 of our GOD THINGS that we wanted to be represented on our altar and magic-markered them on the sticks. (Later, we thought of how nice it would be to use archery arrows with their brightly-colored feathers). I was shocked at how many things my daughter came up with right off the top of her head . . . We finished by planting those sticks in the soil and offering a prayer of thanksgiving. My prayer is that those sticks will be a memorial to us forever, just as those stones are for Israel.
