Hearing God's word

I am doing an awesome Bible study on Gideon via Priscilla Shirer.  We've read/talked/listened in our study to how the Israelites have strayed so far from God in just a few generations, since the time of Moses and Joshua.  One of the reasons is because the parents and older generations didn't take Joshua's words seriously to impress the word of God on the hearts of their children. 

 Obviously, as I am deep in the throes of raising little ones right now, that makes a huge impression on me.  I don't want to be those Israelites.  I want my kids to leave this house with God's words etched into their hearts.

I came across this little passage in my homework this week and it shook me up enough that I had to write a post about it.  Shirer says, "What a difference the systematic hearing of God's Word might have made."  

What struck me, in particular, in that passage was the word "systematic."  I feel challenged and prompted to be more systematic about my kids hearing God's word.  Sometimes I feel like we are in a culture where systematic=boring.  I feel more of a pull to find creative, innovative ways to share things with my kids (and the amount of time and energy necessary to achieve this sometimes prevents it from ever coming to fruition) *ahem, Pinterest*....when the truth is, sometimes the old way of just reading through the Bible from cover to cover is just fine.  Obviously with my two and five year olds this is going to be a developmentally-appropriate Bible (probably a story Bible for the Little Man), but I really love the power that is in "systematic hearing of God's Word."  And obviously it was something God knew to be a tool for remaining steadfast (and remembering what He'd done for his people) because he commanded it to be done yearly in the Old Testatment times.

For us I think this is going to be part of our bedtime routine.  It has been at times during the past, but we always go back and forth between fiction stories and Bible stories.  I think we'll work harder to do a little of both every night with both kiddos.  I'm inspired!