Learn it! Speak it! Live it!
Bring Christmas to a child in need!
An 'urgency': Sensing threats to institutions of society, church leaders make declaration 
Click to Print
Include Comments
Cucumbers and butterflies
The Christmas season — yes, I said it: “Christmas” — is a hot time for Bible sales, particularly kids’ Bibles. But what kind of kids’ Bibles? Some parents prefer kids’ Bibles that use friendly characters and accessible metaphor to communicate the truths of Scripture. Others prefer fewer talking cucumbers and more theological depth.
USA Today explores the thinking of parents, authors, and booksellers on what kind of Bibles are best for kids. What kind would/did you choose for yours?
HT: Michelle
UPDATE: Just checked the comments on this thread. RR needs your help and advice on this very topic.
Topic: Religion, WorldMagBlog
You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.
back to top16 Comments to “Cucumbers and butterflies”
The Bible has talking donkeys, bushes and snakes already. What harm can a talking cucumber do?
(Kidding!)
Report comment to moderator
Glad to have this topic started. My 8yo daughter very emphatically told my wife and I that she would like an NIV Bible for Christmas, with a cover/protector thingy to carry it in.
I believe the interest in the NIV translation springs from our Sunday School curriculum (GCP’s “Show Me Jesus”) that uses the NIV for its homework portions. She gets frustrated looking up scriptures in my (Apostle-approved) ESV, because the word order and vocabulary are a little different from the questions she’s supposed to answer. Our pastor also preaches from the NIV.
So which NIV? We made one of our infrequent trips to the Shrine of All Things Kitschy And/Or Joel Osteen-Related (aka Family Christian Stores) to do some comparison shopping. Settled on the Zondervan Kids Adventure Bible (I think that’s what it’s called) after ruling out the standard pew edition (lousy font, cheap paper), the NIV Study Bible (she’s eight), and several scary niche-marketed Totally Awesome Radical Teen Grrl Bibles with irridescent covers and (worse than the covers) devotionals chock-full of bad theology.
How ’bout the rest of you? I have more youth Bibles to buy, and am willing to listen.
Report comment to moderator
The Shrine of All Things Kitschy And/Or Joel Osteen-Related
LOL!
Report comment to moderator
When our older son was a toddler, I started collecting Bible story books. I started with Read Aloud Bible Stories by Ella K. Lindvall and H. Kent Puckett. I only go Volume 1, but there are at least four. I had lots of fun reading the stories, making sound effects and motions and trying to make them come alive.
When he got to be a preschooler I looked at dozens of Bible story books, looking for ones that seemed appealing but not cartoonish. I can’t say exactly what my criteria were, I just knew that most of the books I looked at were not what I wanted. (A lot of them are what I think of as “Sunday School sappy.”) My favorite for that age was – and still is – Stories Jesus Told by Nick Butterworth, and illustrated by Mick Inkpen. I’ve since come to recognize those two names on a lot of my favorite kids books.
Our church library had Wonderful Earth by Nick Butterworth, and my son loved it so much that I finally bought him his own copy.
Once he started reading in kindergarten, I wanted to get him a Bible story book for him to read himself. Again, I didn’t like a lot of what I found. I finally settled on Caleb and Katie’s Big Book of Bible Adventures by Alan and Linda Parry. And as his comprehension of both reading and the Bible grew, I got him Jesus My King: A Read-Along Bible Storybook on the Life of Christ by Natalie Carabetta.
In second grade we decided he was ready for his own Bible (that’s when the church was giving Bibles to all the children in Sunday School). The head of the Christian Ed committee and I looked at a lot of children’s Bibles, considering the wide range of kids we had, from our son who had grown up knowing the stories to others who knew next to nothing. We finally chose NIrV Kids’ Quest Study Bible from Zondervan, which incorporates the Questions Kids Ask series by Lightwave and Livingstone.
Three years ago his grandfather died, and we gave him Grandpa’s Bible. I don’t know what version it is, but that’s what he always uses now.
Our younger son has enjoyed all the same books, except that we haven’t gotten him his own Bible yet. One Sunday morning he told me he needed a Bible to take to class because they’re supposed to bring Bibles, and he couldn’t find the little orange Gideon’s New Testament that he wanted. I was in a hurry, so I took the first Bible I found handy, which happened to be my old RSV that I was given by the church I grew up in, in second grade. (It has the advantage of having my name imprinted on the front so it’s less likely to get lost and not get back to us.)
I had tried to read it once as a second grader, and found the story of Daniel much less interesting than I remembered it from Sunday School. So I put it away and didn’t get it out again until I became a believer at age 14 (but in a church that called that translation the “Reversed Standard Version” so my father got my the KVJ they all used).
Somewhat to my surprise, my son will sit reading this RSV quite contentedly, with none of the impatience he has with other storybooks that don’t have pictures. And since he has now claimed it as his own, I’m not inclined to try to get him a different one, at least for now.
Report comment to moderator
And since he has now claimed it as his own, I’m not inclined to try to get him a different one, at least for now.
That’s a wise mom.
To broaden this discussion a little, I’m tentatively recommending Starr Meade’s Grandpa’s Box (P&R Publishing, I think) as a unified series of stories for elementary-aged kids. (Ours are 10, 8, and 6; it’s a little advanced for the 6yo) It features devotional-length chapters covering stories from OT and NT, telling the story of covenant and redemption in an accessible and clever way. It’s written as a series of conversations between a grandfather and his grandkids, as he shows them the “war” between the serpent and God’s soldiers.
It’s holding my kids’ interest and prompting some good conversations. My recommendation is tentative because we haven’t finished it, not because I have reservations based on what we’ve read so far.
Report comment to moderator
RR:
I’d opt for a basic, non-age specific, easy font to read copy, with a plain [if the budget allows] leather cover. Don’t forget to keep it as lightweight as possible, my large-print study Bible is gathering dust because it’s just too cumbersome to carry to church/study group. I have a shelf full of Bibles [various translations] because I formerly taught adult Bible study groups, but the one I actually use is a green leather NIV that’s about 8 x 10. It’s easy to carry and easy to write in. It also has the words of Christ in red, a feature I sometimes like and sometimes find distracting.
The child will grow up, so a Bible that can be used for years, and has room for notations, will continue to be a part of his/her life.
Report comment to moderator
Since our church uses the ESV, we got our oldest son an ESV children’s Bible, ordered from Crossway. It’s about 9″ high x 6″ wide and has a hardcover, red, with white on the front cover where the title is. The binding seems decent. It is a red-letter edition (my husband and I both prefer the black-letter edition).
It has pictures, including some that are supposed to be Jesus, and I might not have gotten it if I’d realized that ahead of time. But he likes having his own Bible and does try to follow along during the Scripture readings (he’s 5), then often looks at the pictures during the sermon.
His Christian school uses the NIV, but “version confusion” isn’t really a factor at this point. Once he’s reading, he’ll have to use the NIV at school.
Report comment to moderator
I just recently bought my almost 7yo son a Bible, mainly b/c his reading level is so good. I had though to get an NIV but I looked up what the reading levels were for each translation I found that the NKJV was comparable. I have issues w/ NIV at points and our family Bible is NKJV so.. Anyway, I found a slightly damaged (bumped edge, I think) copy with large print for $7 at CBD. I got a cover for it for about $5. My mom even embroidered his name and a dragon (his request) on it, which he loves.
He now brings his Bible to church and follows along with the pastor (which, as has been pointed out, can be hard when the preacher uses NIV). He manages, though.
As for children’s Bibles, I’ve never been happy with any I found. It always tricks the stories out so that they’re mostly unrecognizable. I’d like a book with pictures of lots of Bible stories, maybe from older paintings, and leave me free to condense the story myself.
Report comment to moderator
My friend just bought her great niece the most interesting looking bible.
It was a pink hardcover, had a large, plastic pearl strand as a handle and resembled a little girl’s dress-up purse.
She thought it was terribly cute for a 5 year old.
I don’t know what I think.
Report comment to moderator
I grew up in Christian school and to this day wish I could find my copy of the KJV Student Bible. It had all sorts of cross references and details I haven’t been able to find in any other Bible. When I taught Disciple Bible Study I used the New Oxford Standard. Loved it too.
Report comment to moderator
I thought version selection was all a matter of personal preference for many years. Recemntly I found out that the American Standard, 1901, is the only version that corrected the KJV’s misuse of the word divorce. (Our modern translations do not have this correction) Since divorce is so common, and the reason for divorce, “putting away” is just as common, it is vital that our generation learn the difference between them and which one God truly hates.
Report comment to moderator
Pauline,
Ella Lindvall is a friend of mine. (I spent Christmas with her family my last three or four years in Chicago.) There are four in that series, and Moody started a similar series (Tell-Me Stories) that ended up having just one title, Parables Jesus told. It’s even better than the Read-Alouds, I think. (Slightly brighter colors, a hint of the gospel in each story.) Then Kent Puckett died, so it was his last book to illustrate.
I give Parables Jesus Told at every baby shower, and consistently, two or three years later the new mom will come to me and say that book is her child’s favorite. I had seven- to nine-year-old neighborhood children in Chicago, poor readers, who read those books every time they came by, for months. They were far “too old” for them, but they liked them, and they helped them establish the habit of reading and then move on to harder books. I sent Parables home with my foster kids when they left me in October, along with the Psalm 23 poster from their wall.
Report comment to moderator
All right, on the subject: I got children’s Bibles for my girls, but it wasn’t anything splashy: Early Reader’s Bible, NKJV. Hard-cover (durable) with a kid-friendly cover, but it basically is a Bible with a few extra line drawings and probably more kid-friendly material in the back. I hate seeing “designer” things like metal covers that try to make the packaging look “cool,” as though the Bible needs an apology.
I recommend against kid versions. Don’t get the NIrV or something like that. Child years are prime years for memorizing, so get a version that is worthy of being memorized and explain what kids don’t understand. I personally don’t like the NIV; I think it takes too many liberties. But if my church used it, I’d happily get it for kids. As my church uses the ESV and I use the NKJV, I figured I needed to choose between those two versions, and I chose the one I use, which is probably a little simpler anyway.
Report comment to moderator
Cheryl D.,
My sister used to live in Chicago – she worked at Moody Bible Institute. She told me she knew one of the people who created those books, though I can’t remember if it was Lindvall or Puckett.
I find that what the church uses for adults is not necessarily the same as what is used in classes for children, where they are assigned memory verses. NIV and NIrV are similar enough for many verses that I’m not sure which one my son is learning his verses in.
I learned most of the verses I know in KJV in churches/schools where it was the only version allowed. I have tried learning some in other versions, but they don’t “stick” – I don’t know if it’s because I’m in my 40’s now, or because even the verses that I didn’t memorize as a teen became so familiar to me in the KJV that nothing else sounds “right.” I finally started trying to memorize 1 Peter in Greek, which I know well enough to do the translation into something that sounds like a synthesis of various English versions.
Report comment to moderator
Pauline,
Your name is supposed to link to your website, but it won’t let me. Could you e-mail me? (extra dot extra at juno com)
Report comment to moderator
Naked Firemen and Cucumbers and Butterfly threads? What in the world is going on around here???!!!
Report comment to moderator
back to topJoin The Conversation
You need to be a registered user of WORLDonTheWeb.com to "join the conversation."
If you are not a member yet, what are you waiting for? Register / Login Now!