Blessed - A Boy, a Bike,
Some Bark, and a Big Bad Break!
Billy’s mom held the door open as he made his way into the school building after a doctor’s appointment on a sunny autumn morning. He could already hear his teacher’s voice coming from the partially open door down the hall. “Class, take out your Bibles so we can begin our Bible lesson for today.”
Mrs. Miller stood before the third grade class. “It’s a new week, and I am proud of how well you’ve been doing on your assignments and quizzes. Several of you have really improved your grades, and I want to assure you that I have noticed your hard work, and I am so pleased. I know your parents will be pleased when they see your next report card. But more important, the Lord is pleased, and ultimately YOU are the one who will benefit and be blessed the most because of your hard work and study. So let’s keep it up, class!”
Step, hop, step, hop. ‘Walking with crutches is slow going,’ thought Billy, ‘but I guess I’m getting the hang of it.’ He heard shuffling as the students got their Bibles out, but the room quieted again, and all eyes were back on the teacher. “That reminds me... Revelation 1:3 promises we will be blessed for even just reading the Bible. “Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand.” Read, hear, keep. God blesses your hard work and study in every subject, but that is multiplied when it comes to learning Bible. I don’t know about you, but that makes me excited about Bible class! I want to be blessed!”
The sound of the classroom door being opened wide caused every head to turn. “Welcome back, Billy!” Mrs. Miller said with a smile. “We’ve been praying every day for you to get better.” Billy slowly maneuvered his crutches through the doorway, and then hopped on his right foot while using his crutches instead of his left foot, all the way to his desk in the second row. Some of the kids waved or smiled, and his best friend D. J. gave him a thumbs up. He had missed seeing his friends during the past week since he had broken his leg. Once in his chair, he put his Bible on top of the desk, and listened to the teacher.
“This month our memorization is Psalm One, so let’s recite together the first three verses we have already learned.”
The whole class began in unison. “Psalm One. ‘Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the LORD: and in his law doth he meditate day and night. And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.’”
“If you have your Bible open to chapter one, let’s read the rest of the Psalm together, starting in verse four.” Once more the students spoke in unison. “The ungodly are not so: but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away. Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. For the LORD knoweth the way of the righteous: but the way of the ungodly shall perish.”
“This Psalm is about how to be blessed, and what kind of person God promises to bless. Blessed means happy; at least that is one of the definitions. How many of you would like to be happy?” Of course, every hand in the room shot up. “The word blessed also means that God approves or is pleased. So the way to be happy is to do and be what pleases God, what He approves of.”
“For instance, what kind of attitude does the Lord approve of, and what kind of attitude does the Lord disapprove of?” Hands went up all over the room, and Mrs. Miller called on Kirsten first. “My mom says God doesn’t like it when we get mad at each other and yell and say mean names. Is that an attitude, Mrs. Miller?”
The teacher smiled. “Kirsten, I do think that would be included on the bad attitude list. There are several words we could call it, but since you used the word ‘mean,’ we will write ‘mean’ over here under ‘Disapprove.’ But let’s think of an opposite word that we can put under what God approves.”
“I know, I know!” cried out Karen, Kirsten’s twin sister. “It’s kind! God says to be kind to each other.”
“Um, Karen, I need you to raise your hand when you know the answer, but that is a good answer to our question. Rather than a mean attitude toward others, God wants us to be kind and treat them the way we want to be treated. Who else can give me a good attitude that God approves of, or a bad attitude that God disapproves of?” Mrs. Miller looked around at the hands raised. “Stewart, have you thought of one?”
“Yes, ma’am. When my big brother gets in trouble for slamming the door ‘cuz he’s mad he’s not allowed to go with his friends, my dad says he has a bad attitude, and he gets in BIG trouble.”
“I think we would call that a rebellious attitude, right?” asked the teacher. “Would that belong on the list of what God approves of or what God disapproves?”
“Disapproves,” said the whole class together.
“So what word would go over here, that would be the opposite of a rebellious attitude?” Kids looked at each other, trying to come up with the right word. “We could use the word ‘obedient’ or the word ‘submissive’ about the attitude that would be right instead of a rebellious one. We won’t name any other attitudes, although there are lots of them. But can you see that for every attitude that’s wrong, there is an opposite attitude that’s right? I want you to remember that in order to be happy and blessed, we need to work on having the attitude that pleases God.”
“Not just attitudes are important, but actions, too. Somebody raise your hand and tell me an action, something somebody might do, that God would disapprove of.” Every hand was waving in the air. “Okay, Millie, what is a wrong action that does not please God?”
“Grandma says that telling lies makes Jesus sad,” Millie answered.
“That’s right,” the teacher agreed. “Lying would definitely go on the list of what God disapproves, but what would be the opposite to go on this list?”
“Tell the truth!” “Be honest!” came from different parts of the room. Eagerness to give the right answer had caused them all to forget to raise their hands.
“Please raise your hand to be called on if you know the answer. Tell me one more thing that is an action that God would not approve?”
“Thou shalt not steal,” said Sally when Mrs. Miller pointed her way. “That’s one of the commandments we learned.”
Mrs. Miller nodded in agreement. “That is one of the 10 commandments, and so is, ‘Thou shalt not bear false witness,’ about telling a lie. So if a person wants to please God, instead of stealing what they want, they should work to earn enough money, and then buy what they want, right? Well, that was a long way to make you stop and think about what makes the difference in whether or not we are happy and blessed. If we want to be happy and we want God to bless us, then we need to do what pleases Him in everything, especially our attitudes and actions, because we make the choice to have a good or bad attitude, and to do or say what is right or wrong.”
The teacher looked at her Bible again. “This first verse talks about people who influence us. Everybody around us has influence on us, but many times we don’t realize it. Definitely your friends and family would be on that list of influences. There might be a friend that you admire, and you want to be more like them, so you know that person is an influence on you. But you may not realize that the people who make TV shows are influencing you, too. People who sing songs and play music and write music, they have an influence on you when you hear those songs. People who write books and magazines, even if you never met them, they still have an influence on you for good or bad. So there are a lot more people influencing you than you thought.”
“If Layla asked me which color T-shirt she should get, maybe choosing between pink and gray, she would be asking for counsel or advice. If I tell her she ought to read a book I liked, that is counsel, too. Every person you meet and many that you never meet, they are all offering you counsel, and God says we cannot be blessed and happy if we follow the counsel and advice and influence of the ungodly, those who are not trying to do what pleases Him.”
“So the first thing God teaches us about how to be happy and blessed is that I ought to do what God approves of, and only allow myself to be influenced by people who will have a good and godly influence in my life. I need to be careful about what kind of friends I choose to spend time with, and if there is a boy or girl who talks wrong or does wrong, then I don’t want their counsel in my life. So I want God’s approval on my friends and influences, too.”
The teacher continued. “The next thing God says about what decides if I am happy and have God’s blessing on my life has to do with the Bible.” She opened the front cover of her red Bible and held it up for the class to see. “Inside my Bible I wrote these words. ‘What you do with this Book will determine what God can do with you.’”
When Mrs. Miller asked the kids to tell her what they ought to do with the Bible, there were several answers, like “Read it,” “Memorize verses,” “Think about what it means,” and, “Do what God says to do.” One of the boys even reminded the class that we are to treat the Bible with respect, since it is God’s word, and not just another old book.
“Those are all good answers, class. To make it simple to remember, I want to narrow it down to this. When it comes to our relationship to God’s Word, we need to love it, learn it and live it. That should be easy enough to remember. Why don’t we say that together. What should we do with the Bible, class?”
“Love it, learn it and live it!” the whole class shouted out together.
“That’s really all of our time for Bible class today, but I want to remind you that in verse three God says if we will delight in His word and obey it, then we will be deep-rooted and strong, just like a tree that is planted next to the river has deep roots that keep it from being toppled over in a storm. The deep roots also supply what the tree needs to bear a lot of fruit, like an apple tree with a lot of apples growing on it. But the Bible tells us that the fruit of a Christian is another Christian, someone who invites Jesus into their heart and gets saved. If we are a deep-rooted, strong Christian, we will be sharing the Gospel and winning others to Christ.”
After Bible class, they proceeded to work on English, Math, Spelling and History, but Billy kept thinking back to the things that Mrs. Miller had taught them about Psalms chapter one. At lunch time, he laughed with his friends as they lined up to write their names on his cast and draw silly faces and pictures with bright-colored markers. At recess they told Billy to be the judge and announce the winners while they had races across the playground.
Right before it was time to go home, they had 20 minutes for Show and Tell. Kirsten and Karen showed the class some pictures from Africa where their aunt and uncle had gone to be missionaries. Monkeys and lions and snakes were among the photos, as well as a group of African children at their Vacation Bible School who had asked Jesus to save them.
D.J. showed them a hornet’s nest wrapped up inside clear plastic that his grand-dad had sprayed and cut down from a tree in his back yard.
“Billy, did you have something you wanted tell us about for Show and Tell?” Mrs. Miller looked his way.
“I didn’t bring anything today,” he said.
“New crutches!” giggled Sally from the seat behind him.
“Yeah,” the class chimed in. “Tell us about your broken leg,” someone said.
The teacher asked Billy to tell the story of his accident, so he began. “I was riding my bike and hurrying to get home because my mom wanted to stop at the drug store on the way to my sister’s volleyball game. There’s a big steep hill on Mountain View Road, and a bridge over the creek at the bottom of the hill before you go up the other side. I was riding faster than ever down the hill, and just before I crossed the bridge, a dog ran out in front of me. I swerved to miss the dog and ran into the ditch and flipped my bike into a big tree right at the edge of the creek. My dad said the bike is mangled up too bad to be able to fix it, but at least it was the bike and not me. He said, compared to the bike, I was pretty lucky to only have a broken leg. I’ll have to mow lawns this summer before I can buy another bike.”
“Last night my dad was helping me catch up the work I missed because I was coming back to school today. When I said those verses in Psalm one, he laughed and said I had first-hand experience learning about that tree planted by the water. We stopped at the place where I had the bike wreck, and we had to look really hard to find the little spot where my bike had made a skinned up mark on the tree. You could barely see it. But the tree totally destroyed my bike. I guess I want God and the Bible to make me strong like that tree!”
Mrs. Miller stood before the third grade class. “It’s a new week, and I am proud of how well you’ve been doing on your assignments and quizzes. Several of you have really improved your grades, and I want to assure you that I have noticed your hard work, and I am so pleased. I know your parents will be pleased when they see your next report card. But more important, the Lord is pleased, and ultimately YOU are the one who will benefit and be blessed the most because of your hard work and study. So let’s keep it up, class!”
Step, hop, step, hop. ‘Walking with crutches is slow going,’ thought Billy, ‘but I guess I’m getting the hang of it.’ He heard shuffling as the students got their Bibles out, but the room quieted again, and all eyes were back on the teacher. “That reminds me... Revelation 1:3 promises we will be blessed for even just reading the Bible. “Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand.” Read, hear, keep. God blesses your hard work and study in every subject, but that is multiplied when it comes to learning Bible. I don’t know about you, but that makes me excited about Bible class! I want to be blessed!”
The sound of the classroom door being opened wide caused every head to turn. “Welcome back, Billy!” Mrs. Miller said with a smile. “We’ve been praying every day for you to get better.” Billy slowly maneuvered his crutches through the doorway, and then hopped on his right foot while using his crutches instead of his left foot, all the way to his desk in the second row. Some of the kids waved or smiled, and his best friend D. J. gave him a thumbs up. He had missed seeing his friends during the past week since he had broken his leg. Once in his chair, he put his Bible on top of the desk, and listened to the teacher.
“This month our memorization is Psalm One, so let’s recite together the first three verses we have already learned.”
The whole class began in unison. “Psalm One. ‘Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the LORD: and in his law doth he meditate day and night. And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.’”
“If you have your Bible open to chapter one, let’s read the rest of the Psalm together, starting in verse four.” Once more the students spoke in unison. “The ungodly are not so: but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away. Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. For the LORD knoweth the way of the righteous: but the way of the ungodly shall perish.”
“This Psalm is about how to be blessed, and what kind of person God promises to bless. Blessed means happy; at least that is one of the definitions. How many of you would like to be happy?” Of course, every hand in the room shot up. “The word blessed also means that God approves or is pleased. So the way to be happy is to do and be what pleases God, what He approves of.”
“For instance, what kind of attitude does the Lord approve of, and what kind of attitude does the Lord disapprove of?” Hands went up all over the room, and Mrs. Miller called on Kirsten first. “My mom says God doesn’t like it when we get mad at each other and yell and say mean names. Is that an attitude, Mrs. Miller?”
The teacher smiled. “Kirsten, I do think that would be included on the bad attitude list. There are several words we could call it, but since you used the word ‘mean,’ we will write ‘mean’ over here under ‘Disapprove.’ But let’s think of an opposite word that we can put under what God approves.”
“I know, I know!” cried out Karen, Kirsten’s twin sister. “It’s kind! God says to be kind to each other.”
“Um, Karen, I need you to raise your hand when you know the answer, but that is a good answer to our question. Rather than a mean attitude toward others, God wants us to be kind and treat them the way we want to be treated. Who else can give me a good attitude that God approves of, or a bad attitude that God disapproves of?” Mrs. Miller looked around at the hands raised. “Stewart, have you thought of one?”
“Yes, ma’am. When my big brother gets in trouble for slamming the door ‘cuz he’s mad he’s not allowed to go with his friends, my dad says he has a bad attitude, and he gets in BIG trouble.”
“I think we would call that a rebellious attitude, right?” asked the teacher. “Would that belong on the list of what God approves of or what God disapproves?”
“Disapproves,” said the whole class together.
“So what word would go over here, that would be the opposite of a rebellious attitude?” Kids looked at each other, trying to come up with the right word. “We could use the word ‘obedient’ or the word ‘submissive’ about the attitude that would be right instead of a rebellious one. We won’t name any other attitudes, although there are lots of them. But can you see that for every attitude that’s wrong, there is an opposite attitude that’s right? I want you to remember that in order to be happy and blessed, we need to work on having the attitude that pleases God.”
“Not just attitudes are important, but actions, too. Somebody raise your hand and tell me an action, something somebody might do, that God would disapprove of.” Every hand was waving in the air. “Okay, Millie, what is a wrong action that does not please God?”
“Grandma says that telling lies makes Jesus sad,” Millie answered.
“That’s right,” the teacher agreed. “Lying would definitely go on the list of what God disapproves, but what would be the opposite to go on this list?”
“Tell the truth!” “Be honest!” came from different parts of the room. Eagerness to give the right answer had caused them all to forget to raise their hands.
“Please raise your hand to be called on if you know the answer. Tell me one more thing that is an action that God would not approve?”
“Thou shalt not steal,” said Sally when Mrs. Miller pointed her way. “That’s one of the commandments we learned.”
Mrs. Miller nodded in agreement. “That is one of the 10 commandments, and so is, ‘Thou shalt not bear false witness,’ about telling a lie. So if a person wants to please God, instead of stealing what they want, they should work to earn enough money, and then buy what they want, right? Well, that was a long way to make you stop and think about what makes the difference in whether or not we are happy and blessed. If we want to be happy and we want God to bless us, then we need to do what pleases Him in everything, especially our attitudes and actions, because we make the choice to have a good or bad attitude, and to do or say what is right or wrong.”
The teacher looked at her Bible again. “This first verse talks about people who influence us. Everybody around us has influence on us, but many times we don’t realize it. Definitely your friends and family would be on that list of influences. There might be a friend that you admire, and you want to be more like them, so you know that person is an influence on you. But you may not realize that the people who make TV shows are influencing you, too. People who sing songs and play music and write music, they have an influence on you when you hear those songs. People who write books and magazines, even if you never met them, they still have an influence on you for good or bad. So there are a lot more people influencing you than you thought.”
“If Layla asked me which color T-shirt she should get, maybe choosing between pink and gray, she would be asking for counsel or advice. If I tell her she ought to read a book I liked, that is counsel, too. Every person you meet and many that you never meet, they are all offering you counsel, and God says we cannot be blessed and happy if we follow the counsel and advice and influence of the ungodly, those who are not trying to do what pleases Him.”
“So the first thing God teaches us about how to be happy and blessed is that I ought to do what God approves of, and only allow myself to be influenced by people who will have a good and godly influence in my life. I need to be careful about what kind of friends I choose to spend time with, and if there is a boy or girl who talks wrong or does wrong, then I don’t want their counsel in my life. So I want God’s approval on my friends and influences, too.”
The teacher continued. “The next thing God says about what decides if I am happy and have God’s blessing on my life has to do with the Bible.” She opened the front cover of her red Bible and held it up for the class to see. “Inside my Bible I wrote these words. ‘What you do with this Book will determine what God can do with you.’”
When Mrs. Miller asked the kids to tell her what they ought to do with the Bible, there were several answers, like “Read it,” “Memorize verses,” “Think about what it means,” and, “Do what God says to do.” One of the boys even reminded the class that we are to treat the Bible with respect, since it is God’s word, and not just another old book.
“Those are all good answers, class. To make it simple to remember, I want to narrow it down to this. When it comes to our relationship to God’s Word, we need to love it, learn it and live it. That should be easy enough to remember. Why don’t we say that together. What should we do with the Bible, class?”
“Love it, learn it and live it!” the whole class shouted out together.
“That’s really all of our time for Bible class today, but I want to remind you that in verse three God says if we will delight in His word and obey it, then we will be deep-rooted and strong, just like a tree that is planted next to the river has deep roots that keep it from being toppled over in a storm. The deep roots also supply what the tree needs to bear a lot of fruit, like an apple tree with a lot of apples growing on it. But the Bible tells us that the fruit of a Christian is another Christian, someone who invites Jesus into their heart and gets saved. If we are a deep-rooted, strong Christian, we will be sharing the Gospel and winning others to Christ.”
After Bible class, they proceeded to work on English, Math, Spelling and History, but Billy kept thinking back to the things that Mrs. Miller had taught them about Psalms chapter one. At lunch time, he laughed with his friends as they lined up to write their names on his cast and draw silly faces and pictures with bright-colored markers. At recess they told Billy to be the judge and announce the winners while they had races across the playground.
Right before it was time to go home, they had 20 minutes for Show and Tell. Kirsten and Karen showed the class some pictures from Africa where their aunt and uncle had gone to be missionaries. Monkeys and lions and snakes were among the photos, as well as a group of African children at their Vacation Bible School who had asked Jesus to save them.
D.J. showed them a hornet’s nest wrapped up inside clear plastic that his grand-dad had sprayed and cut down from a tree in his back yard.
“Billy, did you have something you wanted tell us about for Show and Tell?” Mrs. Miller looked his way.
“I didn’t bring anything today,” he said.
“New crutches!” giggled Sally from the seat behind him.
“Yeah,” the class chimed in. “Tell us about your broken leg,” someone said.
The teacher asked Billy to tell the story of his accident, so he began. “I was riding my bike and hurrying to get home because my mom wanted to stop at the drug store on the way to my sister’s volleyball game. There’s a big steep hill on Mountain View Road, and a bridge over the creek at the bottom of the hill before you go up the other side. I was riding faster than ever down the hill, and just before I crossed the bridge, a dog ran out in front of me. I swerved to miss the dog and ran into the ditch and flipped my bike into a big tree right at the edge of the creek. My dad said the bike is mangled up too bad to be able to fix it, but at least it was the bike and not me. He said, compared to the bike, I was pretty lucky to only have a broken leg. I’ll have to mow lawns this summer before I can buy another bike.”
“Last night my dad was helping me catch up the work I missed because I was coming back to school today. When I said those verses in Psalm one, he laughed and said I had first-hand experience learning about that tree planted by the water. We stopped at the place where I had the bike wreck, and we had to look really hard to find the little spot where my bike had made a skinned up mark on the tree. You could barely see it. But the tree totally destroyed my bike. I guess I want God and the Bible to make me strong like that tree!”
