The Old Family Bible

My Grandfather's Old Bible

FAMILY BIBLE
Old Brother Higgins built a shelf
or the family bible to rest itself
Lest a sticky finger or grimy thumb
Might injure the delicate pages some. He cautioned his children
To touch it not
And it rested there with never a blot
Though the Higgins tribe were a troublesome lot.

His neighbor, Miggins, built a shelf
"Come children," he said, "and help yourself."
His book is old and ragged and worn,
with some of the choicest pages torn, Where children have fingered
And thumbed and read.
But of the Miggins tribe I've heard it said,
Each carries a bible in his head.

"Rock of Ages, Rock of Ages, Cleft for Me."

There's a family Bible on the table
Its pages torn and hard to read,
But the family Bible on the table
Will ever be my key to memory.

At the close of day when work was over,
And when the evening meal was done;
Dad would read to us from the family Bible,
And we'd count our many blessings one by one.

Chorus

I can see us sitting 'round the table
When from the family Bible Dad would read;
And I can hear my Mother softly singing
"Rock of Ages, Rock of Ages, Cleft for Me."

This old world of ours is full of trouble,
But this world would, oh, so better be
If we'd find more Bibles on the table,
And mothers singing "Rock of Ages, Cleft for Me."

-Written by: Willie Nelson

"The Bible"

I hold in my hands a treasure so rare,
I close my eyes and imagine I'm there,
When she wrote each name with care,
Not knowing with me some day she'd share.

Could she have known what a jewel it would be?
That it would be something I waited to see?
That one hundred years later the Bible I'd hold,
That in it's pages more that God's story is told.

I imagine she was proud of her family,
For what greater gift could there be,
Did she imagine the family to come?
That I would be from the family of her son?

This family heirloom I will handle with care,
So that in another hundred years it will be there,
For my great-great-grandchildren may it be,
A gift they are searching for to add to the family tree.
-Author unknown

"I am my neighbor's Bible:
he reads me when we meet,
today he reads me in my house,
tomorrow in the street;
he may be relative or friend,
or slight acquaintance be;
he may not even know my name,
yet he is reading me."

Midi playing is the "Family Bible"

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