An Easter Basket to help your young child grow spiritually

It is not always easy to ferret out what is good, and what is junk, from the plethora of Christian goods available. If you find yourself gritting your teeth when your child brings you a book to read for the 20th time in a day, it’s probably time to donate that to Goodwill, and buy something better. Good materials are pleasing to the adult as well as the child, even when you have to read it over and over.

 

Here is an idea that might help you narrow your focus for choosing items to go in the Easter basket. Sundays can seem really long to young children, especially if their parents are busy doing lots of things at church--teaching Sunday school, talking to people, preparing lunch, etc. If we are not careful, they can begin to think that the church is more important to their parents than they are. One way to counteract that, is to have special things that only happen on Sundays. Buy toys, books, games, videos/DVD’s that are only used on Sundays--to make Sunday a special day. Easter baskets are the perfect venue for doing this, and it gives us a deadline to buy new things each year, so that we keep pace with their growing, developing minds. For more ideas on how to make Sunday special, there is a booklet called, A Day of Delight, making Sunday the best day of the week. It is available through a small company called Doorposts. They have lots of great materials for training children based on Biblical principles. Link to the Doorposts website:

 

Just for Fun

There are so many fun things available, and they change so rapidly, that I will not try to advise you on what to choose. You know your children better than anyone, and you know what will delight them. Check out your local Christian Book Store to peruse the vast array of books, videos/DVD’s, toys, games, puzzles, puppets, crafts, etc. Pictured here are Bible character dolls. If your children like playing with dolls, Bible character dolls and small plastic animals will enable them to re-enact the Bible stories they hear in Sundays school and at home.

Bible story books

These are our favorite Bible story books for 2 and 3 year olds. The stories are really well written, perfect for this age, and there are good questions at the end of each story. Our oldest child could quote all the stories verbatim when she was 2.  It is best to not read  the easy reader Bible story books to your children at this age so that when they begin reading on their own, they will really be reading, rather than saying them from memory.

This is our favorite Bible story book for 4 to 6 year olds. The illustrations are the best of all the Bible story books, bar none. The happy people look really happy, the scared people look really scared--what ever the emotion, you can almost feel it. This is a good age to begin family devotions. It doesn’t have to be complicated. Just make a time each day to read one Bible story to your children, then pray together. To keep it easy to remember, and to keep it from going too long by praying for everything every night, we prayed for missionaries on Monday, friends on Tuesday, the world on Wednesday, giving thanks on Thursday, family (relatives) on Friday, and Sunday school and church on Saturday. (If you noticed that friends doesn’t start with a “T,” you are right, but we used the Japanese word that does “tomodachi.”) You will come up with your own system, but keep it simple, so you don’t feel tempted to skip it.