Peter rescued from prison

Hurray, we had a new visitor this Sunday! A very well-behaved 11-year old who jumped up to help every time someone started putting things away. I like this kid! (True, I like them all…)

Our story:

First, introduce King Herod	Boy with crown
Several years ago, he had a part in letting Jesus be sentenced to death. Now he is quite against the believers, and is happy to have them killed as well. He's already put one of the leaders, named James, to death.	King takes one boy, kills with sword.
A lot of the Jewish leaders were pleased by that, so now he arrests the most prominent leader of all, named:	(ask all: Peter) King takes Peter.
But right now it's just before a holiday, so he decides to keep Peter in prison until after the holiday, & kill him then.	Sit in upside-down wooden table.
He is guarded in his cell by two soldiers	Two boys with swords. Tie wrists to soldiers' wrists.
There are two more soldiers standing guard out at the main prison gate.	Two more boys with swords, in front of "fence" of upside-down stools
Okay, now the holidays are over, and Herod is going to take Peter out and kill him tomorrow. What do you suppose the believers are doing?	Ask all: praying
And Peter?	Ask all
He's sleeping! He is really experiencing the kind of peace that Jesus gives!	Give him pillow to lean on
Suddenly, a light shines in the cell	Turn on flashlight or lamp
And an angel appears.	Angel with halo.
He wakes Peter up	Shakes Peter awake
He tells him to get up & put on his cloak.	Angel cuts "chains," Peter puts on shoes and jacket or shawl
The guards stay fast asleep!	Guards snore
The angel brings Peter out through the front gate of the prison. The gate opens by itself—and the guards there are also sleeping soundly.	Fence of stools opens up. (guards snore)
Peter and the angel walk a few blocks, and then the angel leaves him.	They walk around & then angel sits down.
Up to now, Peter thought maybe he was just dreaming. But now he realizes, he really is out of prison! Quickly, he goes to the gathering place of the believers, and knocks on the door.	Have helper bring him out to bedroom & keep him there knocking on door.
Everyone inside is busy praying, so a young servant girl goes to see who is at the door. She is a little scared—is it soldiers coming to arrest them? So she doesn't open the door but asks who is there.	Girl goes to door and asks who it is. Peter answers, Peter.
Peter! Wow—they were just praying for his release, and here he is! She is so excited, she forgets to open the door & just runs & tells everyone that Peter has come.	She runs and tells the others Peter is at the door.
The believers think she's crazy.	They laugh at her
If it's really Peter, then where is he? Oops! She'd better let him in!	Rhoda runs back and opens the door & lets Peter in.
Everyone celebrates.	Everyone celebrates, hugs, high-fives.
But then Peter needs to get out of the city, because Herod will certainly be searching for him. So we won't hear from Peter again for a while.	Peter shakes everyone's hand & then leaves.

Everything went pretty well except that one of our prison guards got too into his role (ha) and was kicking the prisoner. So we had to make a substitution. We run a humane prison here! (smile) Trying to keep Peter knocking at the door & not just walking in was hard too. Our helper had to make like a door chain & keep it from opening far enough to let him through.

Our game was about "escaping" from entanglement—a game where everyone makes a tight circle and joins hands with any two different people somewhere in the circle. Lots of criss-crossing of hands. Then everyone has to cooperate by weaving over & under until we become one big open circle. I don't know what you call this game, but it's fun.

Craft: we said that very possibly the prison was in the dungeon of Herod's castle, so we did these castle pictures I found in a craft book. Except the craft book called for making the "bricks" with Chex cereal. I can't get Chex here but I could get Life. Unfortunately, this was a little too big for the diagram in the book, so it didn't look right. Plus, it was hugely messy to keep dipping the cereal in the glue. Our kids would be wanting to wash their hands every few seconds! So instead I issued them all with grey color-crayoned square labels of almost the right size (a little too small, but better than too big). They looked nice—I'll have to add a photo later.

For adult Bible study, we talked about how God can do great things even when our faith is as tiny as a mustard seed (or a sesame seed—Bruce passed around a sesame-seed bun and had everyone take a seed as a visual focus)

May God do great things at Merciful Love even when my faith gets overwhelmed by the seemingly hard hearts!!