“Question. Question number one. Question.”
Every Wednesday between 5 p.m. and 6:15 p.m. a large group of sixth through twelfth graders meets in room 210 of the Spring Arbor Free Methodist Church to practice for Bible quizzing.
Sharon Burns and Suzanna McGraw are leaders of the Bible quizzing program. They have the help of seven other coaches who help encourage all of the students who participate in quizzing.
This year, the book of the Bible that the Bible quizzers are studying and memorizing is the book of John. Each week the students must memorize one chapter and specific quote verses. Three chapters of the book and six quotes should be memorized each month for the quiz.
There are two teams in three divisions. One division is young teen rookies, another is young teen veterans and the third is senior teens. Each team has about four players. Even though teams consist of four students, only three are allowed to quiz at once.
Quiz competitions consist of individual and group rounds. An entire team can compete in individual competition, just not together. Students are also recognized if they memorized all of their quote verses over the course of the month. Each church is required to bring at least one quizmaster to the quiz competition. A quizmaster is the person who asks all of the questions. Spring Arbor University student, Steven Owsley is the quizmaster for Spring Arbor Free Methodist.
Owsley said, “When I get back from a quiz, I want to tell everyone about it. I think we should treat God’s Word that way. We read it and we should want to share it with everyone.”
The first quiz of the year was in Westbranch, Michigan. One of our individual competitors, Steven White, finished first and one of the young teen veteran teams came in second in their division. The team will be heading to Winona Lake, Indiana for their second quiz on November 5.
If anyone is interested in being apart of the Spring Arbor Bible Quizzing program you can contact Sharon Burns at gssgsburns@gmail.com. There are opportunities to be a quizzing coach, co-coach or quizmaster.
As the co-coach for a young teen veteran team, Sarah Mobbs, said, “I wish my church had a program like this one. I love being a part of Bible quizzing because I get the chance to interact with my favorite group of people, junior highers.”
According to the Spring Arbor Free Methodist Bible quizzing page, “If you like competition and love God’s Word then, Bible quizzing is the thing for you!”