Apples of Gold

Apples of Gold, written by Lisa Samson is a true treasure for teaching purity to your children ten and older.

I’m always on the lookout for really good literature that brings home the point of purity with a serious message, yet without a heavy hand.  This book meets both of those criteria!  Not only that, but both my daughter and son were completely engaged in the story from beginning to end!  AND, it only took two days worth of devotional reading time to finish!

Warning:  SPOILER!  In order to give you the best understanding of the purity plot, the below description will give away the ending!  If you’d rather not know the ending yet, stop here and just know that I highly recommend the book!  🙂

Written as a parable, Apples of Gold tells the story of two sisters who are very different.  One sister is a tad shy, but very humble and responsible.  The other sister is less humble and enjoys the attention she receives from others.  The governor of their island presents them each with a beautiful apple, which he asks them to protect for one short week until his son returns from a long journey.  Upon his return, the girls are each to present their apple to the son.  He, in turn, (they think) will ask one of the girls to work in his household based on her performance with the apple.

As you can imagine, the sister who enjoys the attention of others ends up flaunting her apple and even letting others touch and bite it, thus ruining it.  The other sister very modestly hides her apple and cares for it so that it stays perfect for the son, and him alone.

As they both approach the son’s home at the end of the week, the sister who enjoys attention decides she will simply use her beauty and charm to win over the prince since her apple is no sight to behold.  The son, however, isn’t impressed with her charm or her beauty because he realizes she couldn’t be trusted to care for “his” apple for even one week.  Soon, both the girls realize this test was worth much more than a job in his household – it was a test to see which of the ladies would make a more suitable wife.

The more humble sister presents the son her apple that is just as beautiful as when she first received it.  Because she saved her apple for him, he tells her that he has been saving an apple, too, for the woman he would marry.  After their marriage ceremony, they exchange apples and take a bite.

Quite the imagery, huh?  Now, quite honestly, I didn’t go too deep with my nine and twelve year olds about the meaning of the imagery.  We simply talked about how we want to keep our hearts and bodies pure for our future mates.  That means we don’t share our heart or bodies with other people beforehand.  Then, of course, I related it to the apple that wasn’t very pretty versus the unblemished apple.

Mrs. Samson includes a letter to young ladies in the back of the book that I chose to skip this time around.  It addresses the meaning behind the book pretty frankly.  It’s not offensive, just something our family isn’t ready to touch on quite so boldly at this point.  At some point when we reread the book (which I’m sure we will many times over), we’ll read the letter together.

I LOVED this book and recommend it highly as another loving “weapon” in your purity arsenal.  Some other books regarding purity we have enjoyed very much include:

What are some of your purity favorites?  I’d love to add to my arsenal, too!

-Written by Cindy, eclectic Charlotte Mason mom of three.  You can find her blogging at Our Journey Westward and Shining Dawn Books.