God forgives sin

 For our picture of God’s willingness to forgive, we chose the story of Peter’s denial.  We began with several disciples sitting around the dinner table with Jesus.  Jesus announces that He is going to suffer, and that all of them would desert him.  They all say they will not, but Jesus says they will.  Peter stands up and says, even if no one else sticks by you, I will.  Jesus tells him that he will deny Him three times before the cock crows.  Peter denies it.  Dinner is over and they all go out for a walk.  They get to a park and Jesus asks His disciples to sit with Him for a while while he prays.  He kneels to pray and all the disciples put their heads in their hands and snore.  Jesus gets up and finds them sleeping, and tells them to wake up because the soldiers are coming.  A few people with swords come and grab Jesus, and all the disciples run away.  The swordsmen take Jesus into a corner of the room and guard Him.

Even though Peter ran away with the others, he really does care what happens to Jesus, and he tries to sneak in closer to find out what is going on.  A servant at the gate says, oh, are you one of His disciples?  He denies it.  It is a cold night, and several people are warming their hands around an orange-tissue-paper fire.  Peter comes to the fire too.  Someone asks him, didn’t I see you taking a walk with Jesus earlier?  He says no, I don’t know Jesus.  Then a girl says, but you have an accent, you must be one of his friends.  Peter loses his temper and says he doesn’t know anything about Jesus.  Then one of the parents crowed like a rooster.  And Jesus from behind his guards turns and stares at Peter.  Peter realizes what he has done and cries, and runs away.

Now three days later, the disciples are sitting together in a room.  Peter is in one corner with his head in his hands, too ashamed to look at anyone.  A girl comes into the group and says, Jesus’ tomb is empty, He has risen!  Peter and another disciple run over and look into the storeroom.  The other disciple jumps up and down and says, “Yes!  Jesus is risen!”  But Peter says, how can you be so sure?

The rest of the story, I confess I took more from Don Francisco’s “He’s Alive” than directly from the Biblical account—but I think it’s true to the spirit of the Scripture!  Peter goes back and sits in his corner.  He says, even if He has really risen, He won’t want me for His disciple any more.  Then Jesus appears.  All the disciples start jumping up and high-fiving each other and Jesus.  All except Peter.  Jesus comes over to Peter and pulls him to his feet and hugs him.  Peter says he is so sorry, and Jesus says, but I have conquered all your sin by rising from the dead!  Do you still want to be my disciple?  Peter says, yes, yes, I do!  Jesus says, then never worry about it again.  I love you.  End of story.  Of our final story in our old-curriculum Merciful Love Family Fellowship!

For our game, we talked about how Peter had three chances to either affirm or deny Jesus.  He chose three denials.  We played human tic-tac-toe to see if denials (X’s) or affirmations (O’s) would win.  X’s won on the second round.

 

We made roosters for craft time.  The rooster’s comb was each child’s traced-and-cut-out handprint; then we added the beaks and eyes.

 

Next week we celebrate our sixth anniversary, and then the new format begins!