Orange Bible merit question

Hi Guys. Do you have to do an entire set of Bible merit lessons form the same unit ie Acts or can you jump around from week to week pick and choosing what one we do?

Good question.

It used to be that, in order for the boys to get a Bible Merit, then they had to complete all five lessons in the Bible "Book". It didn't really matter "when", but it would make sense that you would do them as a block.

Under the new Program of Instruction (using Roman Numerals instead of the names of the books for the Merit Patches), the boys need to do ANY eight Bible lessons to qualify for a Merit Level.

While I don't like the less structure, it does give you flexibility, in knowing that if you teach a Bible Lesson during each meeting, and if you keep good attendance records, then a boy will earn a Bible Merit for every 8 meetings that he attends. It does have an advantage that, prior to an awards service, you don't have to chase the boys down to make-up individual lessons for them to get a merit.

I know that there are some folks who have found outside sources for Bible Lessons. As long as they "meet or exceed" the regular R/R lessons, I don't have a problem with those folks using them.

Even though you don't "need" all five of the lessons in each one, there is a cycle of themes for each lesson, 1-5, like "Godly Manhood", "Integrity", etc. So if you jump around you could theoretically do a bunch of "Godly Manhood" themed lessons followed by a bunch of "Integrity", so forth and so on. It wouldn't be hard to do that if that's what you're driving at, to keep one theme going for awhile because #1 is always the same theme, #2 always the same theme, etc, etc.

Personally I like the rotation knowing that it's going to cycle through all five themes as we go and then start again with the next Scripture book. But as I said, if you're wanting to keep a running theme for several weeks straight, I don't see any reason why it couldn't be done.