Progression

I loved to make learning fun for my children.
It was a privilege to teach them to read.
It was delightful to teach them how to write their name.
Learning colors and shapes and how to count was an adventure.

Since I love words so much, I couldn’t wait for them to love words, too.
Reading to them constantly surely helped.
They loved the sound of the words, as we got lost in the wonderful stories.
They loved to point to the words they recognized and tell me what they said.

Before learning to read words, my children had to learn their letters.
I wanted the process to be exciting and entertaining.
I wanted them to learn but not realize they were learning.
The magnetic letter board helped.

It was a Fisher Price magnetic board.
The magnetic letters of the alphabet were on one side.
A blank rectangle was on the other side.
We would sing the ABC song as I pointed to the corresponding letters.

As they graduated from that simple exercise, I advanced it a bit.
Where is the A? I would ask each one.
They were encouraged to pull the A off the board and put it on the back.
We went through the alphabet and I got to see which letters they easily recognized.

There were always certain letters that were more confusing than others.
There were always those letters that were not as easily recognizable.
They were the letters that remained on the front of the board.
They were the letters that did not move to the back.

Seeing those confusing letters on the front showed me what we had to work on.
Discouragement did not set in, since they had so many letters on the back.
The next time we played I would start with one of the more difficult letters.
It was always so exciting when that difficult letter became recognizable.

They soon began to make words with the magnetic letters.
CAT would become a new word simply by changing the first letter.
Making word families like MAT, PAT, SAT, and BAT helped the beginning reader.
After a while, I would find the children on the floor making words all by themselves.

Our Fisher Price magnetic board is scratched and worn.
It is something I never want to get rid of since it opened the door to reading.
Twenty-six letters in various combinations became the building blocks of words.
Words were the key to reading books for themselves and reading books together.

And read we did!
My girls and I would sit on the porch swing, tucked under a blanket, and read.
I would sit on the floor, between my boys’ twin beds, and read.
I even brought a book to a restaurant to help the littlest one with the long wait.

Letters became words.
Words became sentences.
Sentences became chapters.
Chapters became entire books.

A progression of learning.
A key that unlocked the knowledge of the world and put it right at their fingertips.
Like the letters stuck to the magnetic board, all the books we read stuck to my children.
They stuck to me as well and became a part of us.

Our refrigerator became a blank page.
Another set of magnetic letters was always found there.
Messages were written; names were spelled.
A set of magnetic numbers made simple math a possibility.

Our refrigerator was an art gallery and an educational tool.
Food was inside, but what was on the outside became far more important.
When we bought a new refrigerator, we got a stainless steel one to match other appliances.
Magnets do not stick to stainless steel; my built-in magnetic board was gone.

An end of an era.
The price of modernity.
It is silly to get wistful about a refrigerator.
But I did.

For this very reason make every effort to supplement your faith with goodness, goodness with knowledge, knowledge with self-control, self-control with endurance, endurance with godliness, godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing they will keep you from being useless or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. (2 Peter 1:5-8)

Progression.
The ladder of faith.
Each successive quality seems to spring from the one before.
Those who are in Christ have an abundance of these qualities and produce much fruit.

The person who lacks these things is blind and shortsighted and has forgotten the cleansing of his past sins. Therefore, brothers, make every effort to confirm your calling and election, because if you do these things you will never stumble. For in this way, entry into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be richly supplied to you. (2 Peter 1:9-11)

Like learning to read, our faith journey is gradual.
It begins with baby steps and should progress as we mature in Christ.
A young child is not expected to read chapter books before writing their name.
Likewise, small picture books must be laid aside for deeper, lengthier reading.

Although by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the basic principles of God’s revelation again. You need milk, not solid food. Now everyone who lives on milk is inexperienced with the message about righteousness, because he is an infant. But solid food is for the mature – for those whose senses have been trained to distinguish between good and evil. (Hebrews 5:12-14)

Progression.
Where are you on your spiritual journey?
Are you still on milk or have you graduated to solid food?
Are you still reading picture books or are you diving into the Word of God on your own?

You have to start somewhere.
However, you must not stay there.
We once were infants in our spiritual journey but we should be growing.
Grow in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus and bear much fruit for the Kingdom.