While visiting Immanuel Lutheran Church in Pensacola, Florida earlier this year, my online friend, and friend of LutheranCatechism.com, Bob Myers, presented me with a copy of another great Catechism memory aid, which I have temporarily dubbed Yshnog.
What is Yshnog?
If you asked the question, what is The First Commandment, the answer would be Yshnog, if you abbreviated it with the first letter of each word in the commandment: You shall have no other gods.
Bob has gone through the entire Small Catechism and created these abbreviations. For example, for The Third Commandment, Wdtm (What does this mean?), the abbreviated answer is: W s f a l G s t w d no d p a H w, b h I s a g h a l i. In words, “We should fear and love God so that we do not despise preaching and His Word, but hold it sacred and gladly hear and learn it.”
Since Bob gave me this on Palm Sunday, I have worked with it. This is a good device that prompts well, but does not give too much away. It evokes memory, and strengthens memory.
Download it here, and join in a competition to suggest a better name for it than Yshnog, unless, of course, you like the name Yshnog and think we should keep it. Suggest your names in the comments here or in our Facebook group.
What a great idea! A step between just starting out and having it memorized .. I imagine that it would help significantly.
To bad we don’t have three-sided paper .. would be nice to have memory cards where it asks the question, then if you don’t remember it entirely you get the Yshnog version, then you can check with the full answer!
Sounds like something that a computer/app on your phone could do…