By Vally Sharpe, Asheville, N.C. | I recently ran across a news clipping of me in 1971. It was a listing of the regional winners of what was called the “Bible Drill” by then, a competition held in the Southern Baptist Church for younger kids. Older youth in the church participated in a speaker’s tournament. When I first began to participate, the competition had been known as the “Sword” Drill, a name I still prefer, although the “Bible” Drill is, admittedly, a more descriptive term. Successfully competing in the Sword Drill meant one had to know the books of the Bible and the order in which they appear, from Genesis to Revelations.
Sharpe
The whole “sword” reference came from the fact that the “word of God” is sometimes called the “sword of the spirit.” But it didn’t stop there. The commands “Attention!” and “Draw swords!” and scripture references like “Joshua 4:14” or “Philemon 1:16” would be called out and the sound of pages rustling would commence. Within seconds, someone would step forward, and when acknowledged, would read the verse or passage aloud.
At specified breaks along the way, instead of finding a passage as fast as we could, we were required to step forward and recite it from memory. Before each competition, we were sent the list of verses and the passages we would have to memorize so we could practice, and as I recall, it wasn’t easy. We never knew which verses would be called out or which passages we would be required to recite, so we had to practice finding and learn all of them.
Before a competition, each child was given an official Sword Drill Bible, a hard-backed King James Version not unlike the Gideon Bibles one can still find in hotel nightstand drawers. The Bibles were black, designed to fit in a 9-year-old’s hands—and brand new to make sure that the spines weren’t pre-cracked at just the right places, if you know what I mean.
An actual drill went something like this. At “Attention!” we stood straight-backed with our Bibles clasped in one hand by our sides. At “Draw swords!” we brought our arms straight out in front of us, Bibles still closed, but now held between our palms, with one hand flat on top. Our fingers were pressed close together, including the thumbs—no creeping over to the side for an unfair advantage was tolerated.
I would go on that year to become the Georgia State Champion and represent my home church and association at an exhibition held on a stage at Ridgecrest, the Baptist Retreat Center in North Carolina. I remember thinking the trip was a long way away. In a touch of synchronicity, perhaps, I live fewer than 10 miles from there today.
Years would pass and I would leave the Southern Baptist Church, but I look back on those days with gratefulness, and I always will. Forty-four years later, I can still recite the books of the Bible in order…and my favorite Bible passage—Romans 8:37-39:
“Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
This was the very first passage I learned.
King James Version, please.
(Editor’s Note: The author is a native of Crisp County and a former resident of Gwinnett.)
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