Book Review: An Awesome History Curriculum Resource

One of my goals for 2014 is to read a book every month, and also to let you know about it. This month I have seriously started six books and they are all totally amazing. I have finished any of them, but if you combine my total page read, I have read three books.

Anyway… the reason I haven't finished any of these books is because I got side-tracked by a project (ok, ok, and school and church and life). I am working on enhancing Biblical integration in my classes. But in the process, I came across an amazing resource.

[Just a forewarning, I am a history teacher.]

Answers in Genesis has produced a variety of unconnected curriculum for each subject. This three book curriculum by Diana Waring covers world history from the very beginning through Korea. It is absolutely incredible! Not only is there a fabulous connection between history and the Bible, there are tons and tons of ideas about how to present the material.

Note the yellow tabs! Those are all of the ideas that I gleaned from just this book. I am working on the second book and haven't started the third one yet. But I am very excited. The free previews offered on the AiG website were inspiring.

For each chapter there is student reading material, like a traditional classroom setting. There are discussion questions and personal application. Beyond that each chapter is loaded with information about how to appeal to all of the learning styles and personality types. There are pages about suggestions for research projects, oral reports, time lines, maps, art appreciation, music appreciation, and so much more. Honestly, this curriculum was on par with an excellent college course that I took, but at a middle school or high school level.

As a curriculum, there are additional required resources to fill out the material such as books, lecture CDs, and more. As I am just looking for additional resources for Biblical integration, I didn't feel that it was necessary to purchase the additional items. Without them, the curriculum itself is fairly weak for a history book. It left out a lot of major details, unless you purchase the additional material. If you are using it a supplement, it is no big deal. If it is your primary source, it is a big problem.

If you teach a world history course, this curriculum would be a fantastic resource!

The Honeymoon Stage

Our third anniversary is this week! Yay us! I seriously cannot believe that three years have passed so quickly. Ok, I know everyone says that… but I am allowed to as well. It was such a beautiful wedding! A total whirlwind of a day. My family was going through a terrible trial during my wedding, which made the day tremendously difficult. The emotional strain of planning a wedding plus teaching plus this family trial was exhausting, and I slept for the next two days. Yes, the first two days of my honeymoon.  But my sweet, new husband understood, and the trial made our marriage stronger.

Now three full years have passed - the honeymoon stage. You know those early years where people tell you that everything goes perfectly. And everything is sweet and wonderful, but it's really not?

The honeymoon stage - that time where you get used to sharing your space, your time, your life, your everything? Where you are suddenly responsible for someone else's life. For someone else's laundry and food and overall happiness.

Actually it's not all that easy. How to master the first years:

1.  Remember that he is getting used to you too. 

I didn't understand why my husband had to have Ragu sauce with his spaghetti and he didn't understand why I had to have a certain brand of toilet paper. (He seriously thought it was no biggie if the toilet paper crumbled in your hand as you pull it off the roll. Umm… ewww!)

We had to learn how to make concessions for each other together. I had to just understand that even though pasta sauce was a little thing to me, it was a really big deal to my husband. Like he wouldn't eat my spaghetti if I wasn't serving it with Ragu sauce. But I love him. If he wants that sauce, I will get it for him. And he loves me, so he doesn't mind if I waste a little money.

Sure, that is just a little example. But we replicated this idea over and over and over. Ultimately, we had to remind ourselves every once in a while, that we were still getting used to each other.

2.  Have a private place where you can talk about anything. 

This is our favorite piece of advice to newlyweds. Find some place where you will always be alone and can talk through an disagreement or through a struggle. Your back patio, your kitchen table, an outdoor swing or park bench, your car. Just somewhere you can go during the good times and tough times. Always hold hands or maintain physical contact, even if you are just sitting close to each other. Sometimes when my husband and I just want to get some distraction free time together, we go to this place.

Also this place is a "talk about anything" location. If there are seriously problematic things that you need to discuss, establish early on that this is a safe place where you will mutually listen to each other, and agree to come to a working conclusion together in this location.

3.  Make things special. 

You know those amazingly romantic date nights you had before you got married? Well, you probably understand that you should continue those date nights into marriage. But… then life happens, schedules get in the way, and like many newlyweds (especially in ministry), you are broke. So make the little things special.

New recipe you want to try on him? Call it a date night at home!
Boring Friday night in after a long, busy week? Make a special dessert.
Running the usual weekend errands? Call it an adventure, and stop somewhere new along the way.
Someone said a nice word about your husband? Lavish the praise on him when you get home.
Surprise him with something that he might really need, but didn't want to put the money into. Maybe wrap up with special wrapping paper.
Leave him notes in unexpected locations. (on his pillow, dashboard, keyboard, work email, wallet)
If you usually drive separately, make a big deal when he drives you somewhere.

Make a big deal out of the day to day things. Keeping it special, keeps the spark alive.

4.  Heap on the praise.

Your husband is a special dude. Don't forget and don't let him forget! All of times our guys get bogged down with the frustrations of the ministry, their jobs, and struggles of adjusting to marriage (like being responsible for the finances of the marriage). He is going to need reminded about just how amazing he is. So go for it - heap on the praise! Sneak it any and every time you can.


~ No marriage is perfect, but I have to say mine is pretty close. We have worked on these four things together all three years of marriage. There has been frustration, but we have never had an actual argument. We have hard times, but we have always worked through them together. And remember, above all honor God.

True Acceptance

Read John 5:16-27. 

How many of you did something that was an opportunity to serve someone else this week? Or something that might have been out of your comfort zone?

What is the best birthday party you have ever had? Or been to? 

• Presents 
• Decorations  
• Cake 
• Activities 
• People

Birthdays are something that we all have in common. What is something else that we have in common? 

• Death.

Who has been to a funeral before?

{Here I inserted a personal humorous story about a funeral I went to my first week living in the South. It was a very peculiar experience for me, so I told my class about it, to get them laughing.}

Even if we have nothing else in common with somebody, there are two things for sure that we have in common with them – birth and eventually death.

Jesus was human just like us, so He did these common, normal things. He was born and he died. But what was it that He did that was so uncommon?

• He rose from the dead.

This action totally set him apart from the rest of mankind. No one else was able to raise themselves from the dead.

What was it about Jesus that enabled Him to rise from the dead?

• He was God.

Ok, so keep that in mind…

Let’s look at John 5:1-15.

Jesus was in Jerusalem at the pool of Bethesda. It was just a particular location where certain types of people gather – these people all just happened to have various illnesses and diseases. They hoped that this pool would heal them if the waters were rocky.

More or less, this information would be like somebody walking into church this morning and asking where they could find all of the 7-9^th grade girls. Obviously you would find them in the gym because that is where their Sunday school class is located, and all of their friends are located, and where they have fun.

So here at this pool, Jesus decided to heal a certain man who had been sick for 38 years. Can you imagine? None of us have even been alive that long! But he was sick for 38 years and had been waiting by that pool to be healed, but he was too old, slow, and sick to get into the pool in time.

Jesus knew that this man had been waiting for that long, and healed the man. How exciting! That would be awesome!  Everyone around should have been really excited.

Except for one small thing… It was against the law to heal people on the Sabbath. It seems like a silly rule to us, but it was a big deal to them. So Jesus just broke the law, and everyone is holding their breath.

Then Jesus tells this man to pack up his stuff and go home. This was also against the law.

Then to top everything off, Jesus forgave the man of his sins. Fortunately this wasn’t against the law, but it was heresy, which is even worse.

Why was this heresy?

• Because only God had the ability to forgive sins and the Pharisees didn't believe that Jesus was God. 

Then the Pharisees get wind of it… like they always seem to do… and they were not happy. Jesus broke the law at least twice, and he claimed the authority of God when he forgave the man of his sins. Not good.

Read John 6:16-27.

In this moment, Jesus claimed to be the Son of God. He condemned the Pharisees for condemning Him and His father. He announced that he had the ability to forgive sins.

He offered to every person who was standing there listening and to each of us something extraordinary – true acceptance in Christ. Forgiveness of sins. In God’s eyes perfection. The opportunity to stand in God’s presence as one of his children.

With this He added something that we can have in common, birth, death, and salvation.

So … now that we have something else in common, we already talked about birthdays. Is there anyone who would be wiling to share how they got saved?

{At this time, several of my girls shared their testimony with the rest of the class. It was really exciting because they had heard my testimony before, but never shared. It made our class a little more personal.}

Let It Go

Ok, so I just finished my Sunday School lesson for tomorrow and I am super-excited to share it! It's a little more "raw" than some of the other lessons that I have shared, but that may be because I seriously deviated from what the lesson was supposed to be about. Oops…

Hey, when God lays something on your heart, you have to share it. :)

Technically, the lesson is called "Sharing our Ups and Downs." No clue who produced the original lesson. I only use the book for topic and verses. :)

Sharing is kind of fun sometimes. I don’t like sharing my clothes or my stuff (depending on what it is) with people, but there are other things that I really do enjoy sharing.

Like what?      

• Experiences 
• Time
• Life
• Devotions & What I am Learning in God’s Word
• A bad day

In way or another we probably all like sharing something. The last couple of weeks we have been talking about salvation and how Christ died on the cross for our sins so that we can have a personal relationship with Him. {Side note - I haven't posted those Sunday school lessons yet…Coming soon!}

An essential to having a good relationship is having something in common with someone else, right? Like {my co-Sunday School teacher} and I have things in common (like marriage, growing up together, working with teens, teaching in a Christian school and Sunday school together, we both love shopping, etc) and that helps our friendship.

What do we have in common with God that allows us to have a good relationship with Him?

I mean, let’s think about this… He is God. He created the universe. He is omniscient – He knows everything. He is omnipotent – He has power over everything. He is omnipresent – He is everywhere, all the time. I cannot do any of those things. God and I don’t share those things in common.

God is perfect. He has never sinned. No matter how hard I try, I will never been perfect or sinless. God is righteous. Not only has he never sinned, He cannot tolerate sin. He can forgive mankind of their sins. I can forgive someone of an offense against me, but I cannot forgive them of all of their sins. Let alone eternally forgive every crime against God that they have committed in their past, present, or future.

If I do not have these things in common with God… how can I have a relationship with Him?

When Jesus died on the cross, he was thirty-three years old. He had spent thirty-three years living on earth. He knew what it was like to be hungry, or thirsty, tired, happy or sad. He knew physical pain. He had shed tears. He had laughed. He had family and friends. He wore clothes and shoes. He experienced temptations to sin. He knew what it was like to be offended, lied to, cheated on, hurt, teased, picked on, left out, forgotten, and ignored.

So… Not only did He do something for us, He did something to be like us. To understand what we go through on a daily basis, so that He would have something in common with us. Something so that He could have a relationship with us.

Hebrews 2:14-18 illustrates this point.

14 Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil;

15 And deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.

16 For verily he took not on him the nature of angels; but he took on him the seed of Abraham.

17 Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people.

18 For in that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted.

If you don’t mind… I would like to be honest and say that those verses are really wordy and a little confusing if you just read them straight through. So I would like to discuss them, just so we can have a clearer understanding. 

Side Note: When you come across verses like this, take a moment to stop and think about them. What are they really trying to say? Write it down, paraphrased into your own words. You aren’t changing God’s Word if you are trying to understand it. If you don’t know what a word means, look it up in the dictionary. Ask a parent or a teacher to explain it to you. Sometimes we are tempted to just skip over something because it isn’t easy, but I promise that the Bible is so rewarding if you seek to understand it. 

14-15 God became like us, so that he could destroy the power of death (Satan), and to deliver those who fear/serve death. Or God came to destroy Satan and forgive men of their sins.

16 Verily (meaning - Seriously, or “for real”) He could have been like the angels, but instead he decided to become like the children of Abraham… humans.

17 Why? It was most beneficial for him to be like a man so that basically, He could have a better relationship with man. 

18 Why? Because if He has been through what we go through, then He better help us.

Doesn’t that make so much sense? God became a man so we could have a better relationship with Him because He understands the temptations that we go through every day. He experienced them too.

Wow! God is pursuing me. That just makes me stop and think. Sometimes I get so caught up in the fact that God came to earth 2000 years ago just so He could die on a cross, rise from the dead, and forgive sins. And yes, my sins are forgiven eternally. But I think that I am sometimes stuck on earth, forced to struggle through the muck and mire of the world, still struggling with sin, waiting to die and go home to heaven.

But that isn’t it! God did die on the cross, rise from the dead, and forgive sins, but He also knows and He understands. He has been there too. And if you think of how much worse it must have been for Him! Christ was perfect. He lived in a perfect Heaven, created a perfect Earth. Then to come here, live here for 33 years, see His perfect creation corrupted by sin and face the temptations that we face. Perhaps even more… because He was perfect. It must have been so much harder and so much heavier of a burden for Him, than I will ever have to bear.

He could have turned around, refused the cross, thrown away the plan. He could have left us here. Let us deal with our temptations and sin alone.

But He didn’t. God wants to have a relationship with us. He gave up everything to have a relationship with us. He is pursuing us. That is too amazing to ignore. How can I shake off someone who wants to have a relationship with me that badly??

If a girlfriend wanted to be friends with you that badly, how would you respond? If a boy chased after you like that, wouldn’t it get your attention?

Now that God has your attention, it’s time to turn to Him and have that relationship with Him. But without throwing out pat answers and quotes from other people… What does it mean to have a relationship with Jesus Christ?

The thing that I love about the book of Hebrews is that it connects the Bible. It’s the final puzzle pieces. It’s like a commentary on the Old Testament, explaining how Jesus Christ fits into the Law and traditions of the past. The author spends the entire book explaining how and why this miracle-working God of the Old Testament would come down from heaven to forgive sins. Then if that weren’t enough, Hebrews 11 gives us all of these people who chose to have a relationship with God without ever hearing the name of Jesus Christ.

Then chapter 12 tells us what it means to have a relationship with Christ.

1 Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, 2 Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. 3 For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.

So according to Hebrews 12, this is how we have a relationship with Christ...

1.  Lay aside the sin and weight that holds you back. Let go of the stuff that makes having a relationship with Christ hard.
2.  Don’t give up. “Run with patience” – keep trying. Yes, we are going to mess up. Yes it is going to be hard and challenging, but…
3. Look to Jesus. Follow His example. He has been through the things that you and I have been through. He knows what it is like. He knows how hard the temptations are, but we can trust Him, rely on Him, look to Him, and have a relationship with Him to get through.

This week, I challenge you to read through the book of Hebrews. As you go, write down what a verse means in your own words like we did today. Figure out what sin is holding you back and let it go. Get it out of your life.

God has done so much to pursue us. If He has your attention, start that relationship with Him.

Photo Credit: http://addmytag.tumblr.com/about