Photo and Commentary ©2024 by Maylan Schurch
Friday, August 2, 2024
I’ve found our local library a delightful (and mercifully air-conditioned) refuge when I’m working on a sermon. Shelley and I are so grateful that it’s barely a mile from where we live, and we enter its doors often.
Thursday of this week, as I was about to leave through those doors, the above colorful bulletin board caught my attention. “Summer Readers” is printed at the top, and each of the post-its bears the name of a child. My original photo has better pixel resolution, which means I can read the first names of these kids, and it’s heartwarming to see that—if one can judge by these names—many ethnic groups are represented.
You might be able to see that each post-it bears a number. The yellows are #1, the salmon-colored are #2, and the greens are #3, and there are even a few pinks (#4).
Shelley and I puzzled over this photo for several minutes, trying to figure out what the different numbers stand for. She even looked on the library’s website to see if she could find the answer there. No luck. I thought they might be grade-levels, but to have an overwhelming number of first-graders, who are barely learning to read, doesn’t seem to make sense.
Bottom line: maybe 100, or close to it, kids were willing to print their names in labored letters on the slips, and declare before all the library patrons that they are indeed “Summer Readers.”
That’s good. My first career was as a college English instructor, and I would constantly tell the students, “Look. Grammar and spelling are important, but the more you can learn to love reading, and read a lot, the more you’ll learn these principles by osmosis rather than having to study lists of rules.”
Jesus was in favor of not only reading but of comprehension. Telling His disciples about end-time events, He recommended the book of Daniel. “Whoever reads, let him understand,” Jesus said, referring to an important prophetic detail in the prophet’s book (Matthew 24:15 NKJV).
And in the introduction to the Book of Revelation, Jesus’ close friend John writes, “Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written in it; for the time is near.” (Revelation 1:3)
Read . . . heed . . . keep.
If you’re planning to become a “summer reader” of the Bible, check out the following link in which Scripture describes itself: