A Special Sunday

We had heard about a sister church in Hong Kong that had a Sunday school program for special-needs kids and their parents, and this Sunday was finally the one where we were all able to get together. We had nearly fifty, so were very thankful to be able to borrow the Centro O Amanhecer daycare center for the occasion.

We took a break from our unit on Old Testament women in favor of a story that would have a more direct application to both groups: the importance of thankfulness. Conveniently, this was just three days after the American holiday of Thanksgiving!

The story of Jesus healing the ten lepers is not terribly long, but it took plenty enough time to get all our lepers kitted out in bandages and face masks.

Lai Wun ended up looking more like a surgeon than a leper, but she was cute anyway!

One thing we could all be thankful for was that, whatever our problems, none of us are afflicted with leprosy! In Bible times it was a particularly frightening disease, entailing as it did exile from the community. We had folks throwing stones (paper wads) at them. A few of the kinder ones threw food (small packets of crackers) for the lepers to share. All in all a miserable existence. So when they saw Jesus at a distance, having heard that He was a healer, they all cried out for mercy. Jesus told them to go show themselves to the priest. They scratched their heads at that. How come? Did Jesus want the priests to confirm their leprosy so He would know what He was up against, or what? Whatever—they started walking, when suddenly, one of the boys (who had been complaining that he wanted to take his bandage off anyway) said, "Hey, guys, I have feeling in my leg all of a sudden!" He got to take off his bandage and say, look, it's healed! That was the signal for everyone to take off their bandages, give high fives all around, and head off for the unseen priest (a volunteer just escorted them out the door of the main room temporarily. All but one, who stopped and said, I better go back and thank Jesus while I still know where He is. (Actually, our Jesus had disappeared; tired of his inactive role. So his brother became the stand-in.) So the one came back and knelt at His feet saying, praise God, praise God! Jesus lifted her up and praised her for having a thankful heart which is even more special to God than strict obedience.

For our game, we divided into two teams. Instead of running to Jesus and falling to their knees, the race involved running to Jesus on their knees. He would then lift them up and they could run back to their team. The extra twist in this was that each "runner" had to wear knee protectors (those lepers need to protect their skin, you know!), so as each child got back to their team they had to take them off for the next child to put on. This was not exactly done "decently and in order," and you couldn't prove which team had actually won, but it was fun anyway!

The craft was fairly simple; making "tambourines" to sing praises with. Each child got a foil pie plate, and eight small jingle bells to attach along the rim with florist wire. Everyone seemed to prefer wearing them as hats rather than using them as musical instruments, though!

We didn't have a regular Bible study during the last period; while the kids had some free play time, the adults heard a testimony of thankfulness for God's grace from a Hong Kong father with two autistic sons. Afterward we all enjoyed a catered "potluck" meal together, while families from the two churches got to know one another better in individual conversations. A group this large every week would be truly exhausting (I trust if we get this large we will have more volunteers available!), but once in a while is great!