I’m a sucker for timelines.

Back in our homeschooling days, I made a timeline that wrapped around our dining room and continued up and down the hallway. There were yards and yards of ancient history, decades condensed into mere inches, all the way to the year 2000. That’s where the line of time stopped, as we were out of wall space.

(Not much happened in the 1200s.)

Contributions to our homemade timeline were made every year: Katie’s favorite books and authors, Sam’s sports facts, Anna’s musicians and Jacob’s inventors. We began to see the sweep of time come to life before our eyes. Events happened around the world that we never would have connected before.

• Mozart was composing sonatas at the same time Daniel Boone was blazing the Wilderness Road.
• Abner Doubleday came up with a game called baseball as Dickens was writing “A Christmas Carol”.
• Chocolate chip cookies were accidentally invented while Hitler was marching into Austria.

When we moved away, the timeline came along and encircled our new basement. Eventually, the kids entered public school and the timeline came down. It was the year 2000. I had come to the end of my time as a homeschool teacher. Twelve years of our family’s educational history was rolled up and placed in a box, along with a few tears.

I’m thinking about this as a school year begins. Nothing thrills my heart more than a fresh start and the wide open possibility of learning new things. I’m diving into Joshua this fall, so of course, I made a timeline.

As Moses ran away to the desert after killing an Egyptian,
Joshua was born to Israelite slaves.
Forty years later, Moses returned to lead those slaves out of Egypt,
and Joshua became his right hand man.
You just never know what might happen down the line.
But something is always happening.
Even when we can’t see it,
He’s working.

“My times are in Your hand.”
Psalm 31:15