Run for the Prize and The National Bible Bee

Pardon me for doubling up but I want to get ya'll to our cruise.  So, here is a two-fer.

Our pastor is pretty amazing.  He gives us Awana people a break during the summer and runs a summer program.  He's been developing this program for several years and each year there is a different theme.  This year it was Run for the Prize.  The kids continue to work on memorizing verses relevant to the theme and at the end of the year they get recognized for all their hard work.

 Bryant was thrilled to be a part of the program at the end of the summer!

 Ceili Rain worked on Run for the Prize verses AND Bible Bee verses.  If you ever want to hear the most precious recitation of God's word, just listen to her quote.  She has a very good memory and I can see her giving Zoe a run for her money when she gets older.

 Our pastor is also a tad cheesy and goofy.  

 And Zoe.  Well, before Bible Bee started, she decided she would just go ahead and memorize all of the Run for the Prize verses so she could focus on Bible Bee.  And she did.  Then she memorized 24 passages for Bible Bee.

And on to that.  This was the first year our kids competed in the National Bible Bee and the first year our church hosted it.  It was a ton of fun and we got to meet and host a family the night before the competition which was even more fun (thirteen children and four adults actually made it to the competition with minutes to spare...oh yes we did).

The National Bible Bee competition consists of local hosts church holding a competition in August.  The kids, ages 7 to 18 (and broken down by age categories) take a written exam of 200 questions based on the book of the Bible that was studied over the past 12 weeks.  This year it was 1 John.  After that, each child, meets with two judges and are given a scripture reference.  The child recites the scripture and is scored based on the accuracy.  Zoe and Ace competed in Primary this year.  Zoe won.

She loves to have her picture taken.

The night of the summer program recognition, we found out Zoe not only won our area bee.  She also qualified for the National Bible Bee.  Of course, this being our first year, we jumped at the chance!  She has been working since August to memorize over 70 passages (of course, she is not quite there but she is working on it) and we are studying Ephesians.  This month, we'll travel as a family to the National Bible Bee where she will compete with 120 other kids.  We are so excited to be able to experience this together as a family.