These are some of the lovely people that we invited into our fun we call Reformation Day. It really has become one of our favorite celebrations we do during the year. Last year it was John Calvin and this year was Jonathan Edwards.
Our kids spent most of October reading books like, "Jonathan Edwards: America's Genius." Does it make anyone else nervous when they think of what their tag line might be if someone might write our memoirs. "Carrie: Utterly Clueless, God Help her Soul." I'm pretty sure it would read something like that.
We did a "Jonathan Edwards, This is Your Life," type of show for the audience. Each kid had a part of Edwards' life that they would portray. Charis and a friend were two of his daughters and talked about him as a father, Kesed was Edwards as a child, Makaria brought out a few pictures of he and Sarah.
Malachi read about Edward's life as a preacher and his conflict with his grandfather, Solomon Stoddard, over the issue of baptism. Later he came out as one of the Indians in Western, MA whose life was changed by Edward's ministry out there.
Selah played Sarah Edwards and shared about their 11 children and life at home. She later came out as a congregant in his church during the Great Awakening.
The kids rocked it. I was so proud of their research and oratory skills.
Like always, we played the "Pin the something on the something," game. This year it was "Pin the spider dangling over the fire," to commemorate Jonathan Edwards famous sermon "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God." Funny enough, this sermon was fairly uncharacteristic of Edwards preaching, but it is the one that gets studied in schools. The spider represents us being held by God over the fires of hell, only being rescued by his merciful hands.
Selah won the game. Several of the spiders ended up in hallways, on lights, and buried in a bookshelf. I blame it on the repeated spinning that took place before walking to try and put the spiders on the string. We headed over to eat 18th century New England type food. It was beef stew, rosemary salted sweet rolls that will make you call your mama names, apple pie, and wassail. Wassail reminds me of my grandmother. It was never apple cider, always called wassail. Parchessi also reminds me of her. In case you were wondering.
We had a fabulous Reformation Day and can't wait until next year.
