A recent discussion, begun around our dinner table and finished on Facebook, failed to exonerate International Bible Quizzers of the crime of insufferable know-it-all-ism. So maybe it is at least partly true... maybe even mostly true... that some of us might possess a tendency toward behaving like insufferable know-it-alls. Okay, I lost the argument before it ever started. But there's more to the story of Bible Quizzing than a bunch of insufferable know-it-alls roaming the US and Canada and beyond, preying on the under-privileged majority of non-quizzers.
For the completely uninitiated, Bible Quizzing is a sport in which youth in grades 7-12 spend massive amounts of time memorizing entire books of the Bible and meeting together monthly to compete against their peers. For some questions, the difference between right and wrong is be the difference between "a" and "the," and at the higher levels, a quizzer may hear only one syllable of one word before he or someone else jumps to answer the question.
So if we are insufferable know-it-alls from time to time, please forgive us. We spent innumerable hours memorizing books of the Bible word perfect and were trained to be quick, bold, and... RIGHT. We were even taught to challenge judges' rulings with which we didn't agree. Being an insufferable know-it-all is certainly not a noble thing, but it can be a hard habit to break, especially when you put a bunch of us together... because let's face it, talking smack with old rivals and friends can be a lot of fun.
But really, on the whole, we're not so bad. We gained much more from Bible Quizzing than an overactive attention to detail (especially when it comes to words and especially when those words are in argument form) and a tendency to let our competitive side overtake our more tender natures. In fact, for some of us, Bible Quizzing served to tame our cockiness. I freely admit that I am competitive, that I like to be right, and that I can argue with the most animated of debaters, though perhaps not with the most logical of debaters. Well, I can argue with the logical, but I'm sure I just exasperate them. (Ask Geoff about that sometime... or a certain Doug who has cringed at more than one of my arguments).
I'm guilty of much, but I also remember one day when my coach called a time out to scold me for being cocky, threatening to pull me out of the quiz if I kept up the attitude, and I have tried not to forget that lesson in the living of real life. I enjoy a smack talk discussion every now and then, but when it comes to serious, real life matters, I try to remember that being right and being smart are nothing compared with being considerate, forgiving, and compassionate. Anytime I begin to forget that, which is more often than I care to admit, I remember Carolyn looking me in the eye and telling me in no uncertain terms, "No one likes cockiness."
Attention to detail and competitive drive aside, both of which might be innate and completely unrelated to quizzing, we learned a lot through Bible quizzing, from quizzing with our church teams to quizzing with our District teams at Internationals. At least I did. Thinking of all I gained through Bible Quizzing, I'm willing to accept the lighthearted title of insufferable know-it-all, especially since I'm married to a self proclaimed insufferable know-it-all. Birds of a feather and all that... ;)
But seriously, I'm making a list of what I really got out of quizzing, and it looks pretty amazing so far.
1. A treasure trove of Scripture, some passages more firmly rooted in my mind and heart than others. Plenty of verses have slipped through the cracks or been squeezed out as more information has crowded my mind, but large portions of what I memorized in my youth remain. The sort of intricate memorization one engages in through Bible quizzing is the sort that sticks. An interesting side effect is that the mind trained to pick up and preserve every detail in memory also picks up and preserves verses one never intended to memorize, so I remember verses not only from the books on which I quizzed, but from non-quizzing passages I read during that time. I don't say that to boast... It is a wonder to me sometimes that I haven't forgotten everything, and it convinces me that Bible Quizzing is something I desperately want for my children. (And if you attend my church and want it for your children, please let me know!) A great treasure this is, as verses memorized long ago come to mind to correct, encourage, comfort, and inspire as needed. As an adult, I've attempted to memorize portions of Scripture, and frankly, it's not as easy as it used to be. Responsibilities and distractions are greater and harder to dismiss than they were when I was sixteen. I am thankful for the opportunity Bible quizzing gave me to commit so much Scripture to memory in my younger, simpler years - and thankful to God for causing so much of it to remain to enrich my older (but not too much older), fuller life.
2. A precious network of friends, some sprung in the most unlikely of soils, is another gift of Bible quizzing. I spent a lot of time with my church team, and my coach, the marvelous Ms. Carolyn a.k.a. My Second Mom, made sure everyone on the team understood that each of us was an integral part of our team. I might quiz out without error in the first four questions of every quiz, but at the end of the day (literally, on the three hour drive home), nobody could massage half the team's feet like Allen. We were required to work together, encourage one another, and appreciate each other, regardless of personal score averages. Because a team rolls like that.
The District Team took this concept a step further. After competing against each other all year long, five of us were thrust together, put on equal footing, and required to work together to prepare for and compete at Internationals. Some of us were instant friends, but some of us... Well, we didn't exactly like each other. I think of two friends - I call them friends now - in particular. The first gave me more dirty looks than I could count, and I thought more unkind things of her than I would tell; when I think of her now, I remember more vividly her laughter, her honesty, her vulnerability, and the night she, I and the other girl on our team shared our souls and tears. The second irritated me like nobody's business the first year I quizzed with him. The next year was considerably better, and at this point in our friendship, I am so proud of the husband, father, and pastor he has become. Somewhere along the way, I realized that underneath the insufferable know-it-all attitude (I use that term lightheartedly now, understanding I was as guilty, if not more so, of being an IKIA.), he is a long-suffering, compassionate, intelligent child of the God who loves us both. More importantly, I realized that he's watched me grow up (I hope!) as much as I've watched him grow up. (See italicized comment above. I was a twerp). I'm sorry I didn't give him more credit from the start, and thankful to have known him then and now.
And then there's the friend who was a rival on many levels, and I'm sure she knows who she is. We often joke about the beginnings of our friendship - which looked nothing like friendship at the time. Over the years our opinions of each other have progressed from thinking each other exasperatingly weird and perfectly snobbish to knowing without a doubt that the other will understand our stranger, more convoluted musings on a wide range of topics, if not on the subject of orange couches.
Another friend has sprung from unlikely, though not at all rocky, soil. This friend cheered me as I was saying goodbye to friends at the end of Internationals in 1993 and has been a pen pal off and on ever since. I haven't seen her since that one week in New York eighteen years ago, but she encourages me in ways she'll never know, and I cannot think of her without remembering her cheerfully reminding me to smile as I said my teary goodbyes.
There are many more friends from quizzing whom I ought to mention, but find no good nor succinct descriptions of our friendships. Carolyn, Liz, Matt, Melanie, Stacy, Melissa, Michele, Susanne, Myssi, Andrew, Karen, Connie... too many to name, and I fear excluding some deeply treasured friend who has slipped my distracted mind! There are so many who were there from the start, whose paths crossed mine for a year or two, who somehow shared in the whole quizzing experience. To some I remain close, while others have faded to memories. For all, I am thankful.
I have always had a special place in my heart for my quizzing friends, and as I age, I appreciate them still. I thought little of it at the time, but memorizing entire books of the Bible is not exactly "normal." I love that there are people out there to whom memorizing books of the Bible was just another teenage day. They aren't impressed, nor do they think I'm weird (at least not for this). They get it. They've been there. They've done that. And many of them cherish the memories of Bible Quizzing as much as I do.
Quizzing was intense. It required time, energy, and a single-mindedness hard to come by these days, and gave back extreme highs and lows of emotion, a lifelong treasure of cherished Scriptures and precious friends, and so much more. Looking back, I can't believe I put so much into it. Looking back, it was the best way to have spent my youth.
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