By Carol Purdy
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"Can I help, Mommy?" is a question I am asked by my little girls almost every day as I am busy in the kitchen. They are so anxious to do grown-up things, to be useful. I try to remember how I felt at their age and squash the tendency to say no because I am too busy. Someday they may not ask any more and then I'll really need their help!
In Least of All, Raven Hannah is not only the youngest child in her family, she is the only girl, a double whammy. Her brothers all have Bible names, but when she is born her father wants to name her Raven because of her black hair. After he assured her mother that there was a raven in the Bible that came back to Noah, she agreed to christen their little girl with that name.
Raven Hannah grows and becomes somewhat of a pest, following her brothers everywhere around the farm as they try to do their chores. Every time she asks to help, she is told she is too little. Finally the marvelous day arrives when there is a chore she can take on herselfÑchurning the butter. Not to complain too much, but this job is a lonely one, down in the cellar, so the industrious girl props up the big family Bible nearby to keep her company.
As she peruses the funny lines and squiggles on the pages, Raven Hannah notices that the marks on the first page are the same as the verses in Sunday school that her teacher wrote on the slate. Raven knows those words! She begins comparing the verses she has memorized to the words in the Bible, and soon she is teaching herself to read.
Imagine the surprise one stormy afternoon, as the family gathers indoors, when they hear their little girl reading from the Bible. Raven is the first one in the family to learn to read. Grandmother is proud in a water-eyed sort of way, especially when the little girl offers to teach her how to read, too.
But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty; and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are, that no flesh should glory in His presence. But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from GodÑand righeousness and sanctification and redemptionÑthat, as it is written, "He who glories, let him glory in the Lord." I Corinthians 1:27-31
