An Example of a Teachable Moment

A few evenings ago I caught Peanut (5) singing a silly childhood song about trick-or-treating, smelly feet, and underpants.  (I’ll give you a moment while you sing it too.) 

While bordering on unappropriateness, it is a song that has been sung by children for many generations around Halloween because of its catchy lyrics and simple sing-song melody. Obviously proud of the new song he learned and the elementary-level humor, he repeated it several times.

But it was the comment he made after singing the song that spurred a conversation.

When asked why he continued to repeat the song, he told me, “Mom, I just can’t get it out of my head.”

This, here, is a teachable moment, friends.

So I replied, “Wow…the song you are singing reminds me of a Bible verse.”

“Peanut, the Bible tells us what we are to think about.” I began quoting Philippians 4:8.  “Whatever is ____….”  He filled in the blanks with the words from the verse.  (Peanut had memorized this verse from the Seeds Family Worship CD #5.)

“Is this song pure, lovely, praiseworthy?” I asked him.  “No,” he replied.

And then we discussed the importance of monitoring what we put in our minds.  If we put ideas in that are true, noble, right, pure… we will dwell on excellent and praiseworthy things.  Then we will sing and say such things.  If we put the opposite in, then negative, lies, and yucky thoughts will be spinning in our heads and our words will follow the same tone.

To quote an old adage, “What goes in is what comes out.”

Oh wait…that is based on a Bible verse too.

But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them.  Matthew 15:18

In the scheme of things, he didn’t do anything horrible.  He was simply singing a catchy tune.  But not tying his comment to a truth of the Scripture would have been a major error on my part.  I would have failed to capitalize on a God-given, teachable moment.

This is just one example of using moments in our day to point our children to the truth of the Bible to guide them to the heart of the issue.  I promise if you begin to look, you will see thousands more.

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