Week 13 - Constantine, the Nicene Creed, and the fall of Rome

Here are a few highlights from our week...

This week was a short schooling week for us...just 3 days. The next was just 2, so together, it was one full week ;) Our church is one of the drop off locations for the Operation Christmas Child shoe boxes, so we volunteered several hours by collecting the shoe boxes, redoing labels that were faded or missing, 'rubberbanded' shoe boxes so the contents wouldn't fall out, and taped up a ton of large boxes. On Sunday, we prayed over the shoe boxes and a large portion of the congregation stayed behind for about an hour to pack all these shoe boxes into larger boxes to send to the next location. 

Bible
More Revelation. I try to explain the simpler things, but this book is hard to understand.


History
Trial and Triumph is a great book! While it is sad to hear about what these brave early Christians went though, it is amazing to read about their faith and courage for Christ.

The kids started putting the bigger picture together in how riches and greed began to play a part in early Roman church history and how, as beneficial as Constantine was to the early church, played his part in all of that by 'glorifying' church leadership.

We learned about Athanasius and the Nicene Creed and saw how and where the early disputes of the Trinity began. We talked about current religions that are still divided on this topic today and those that still side with the early Arian beliefs to this day.

We learned where the lie of earning your salvation and salvation through works entered into the picture with the Pelagians and how Augustine fought for the truth of salvation through God's grace alone. We also talked about current religions that still believe in the lie of earning one's salvation.

Science

We never did get to that bone experiment from several weeks ago. We forgot that we had left the bone in the vinegar. It was there for at least 2 weeks before we remembered. By that time, it stunk, was gross, and none of us wanted to mess with it.

We are now on to the digestive system. We labeled all the pieces from The Body Book and added those to our skeletons. The kids finally got around to putting their skeleton model together too.

We are taking off the entire 1st week of December. We all need a break. School prep is getting to me and things are piling up at the house. We are gonna try to get away for a few days and just spend some quality time together  having fun :)