Didn’t take
any pictures last Sunday. Just too
busy “doing” to step back with the camera.
First we reviewed that Joseph was Jacob’s favorite kid. Showed a picture of Joseph, wearing an
origami shirt and labeled, “Jacob loved Joseph…he was Rachael’s son.” Then asked, who is Mary’s favorite kid? Before anyone had a chance to guess, the mom
who was helping out that day said, “every single one” which was the right
answer. I reeled off my (prepared ahead
of time, I admit) reasons each one was special, and then we sang our “God
created so-and-so and did a great job” song, with one verse per kid. Then they made little origami shirts like
Joseph’s, stuck them onto a paper-doll type background, added their own photo faces,
and stuck on labels that said “We love so-and-so…he/she is such-and-such” (note I deliberately left out the word
“because”) This was one of those crafts everyone chose to take home, so the
only picture I have is Joseph’s.
Then we began our story. Chose the only boy as Joseph, and had him wear
the “coat” we’d made two weeks ago. His
brothers (all the other kids) were at the front of the room watching the sheep
(flock picture on the whiteboard), while Joseph waited at the back. The brothers said, hey, here comes our little
brat of a brother. Nobody is around to
see us, let’s kill him! We asked, was
that a good idea? One brother yelled out
NO! And of course that was what happened
in the Bible too. So instead of killing
Joseph when he came to the front of the room, they ripped his fancy coat off
and threw him in a pit, which in our case was the kneehole under the teacher’s
desk. He did NOT like being under there,
though. So we ended up putting him in
one of the chairs (all our chairs have desktops attached, so I say “in”)
against the wall, and surrounding him with other chairs so he was
“trapped.” Then all the brothers sat
down to eat their snacks. They had pity
on Joseph and let him have a snack too, but didn’t let him out of the pit. That is, until the slave traders (the two
teenage helpers) came along and the brothers decided to make some money off
Joseph. The traders gave each brother a
couple of coins & then took Joseph away with them. The brothers then squirted ketchup on the
torn-up coat, and brought it to show “Jacob”
(a father who happened to be there as a chance to see his daughter—parents
are separated) who obligingly pretended to cry over his presumably dead son.
Next took a break from the
action to talk about how the brothers thought they’d be happy if they got rid
of their brother, but they weren’t.
First they had to see their dad cry, and then they had to spend the rest
of their lives worrying about whether he would find out what they did! So our verse from the last lesson, pursue
what makes for peace, shows its merit again.
Meanwhile what has happened to
Joseph? He becomes a slave to Potiphar,
and he decides that he will pursue what makes for peace. For example, if Potiphar tells him to sweep
the floor, is it better for him to sweep, or to say he’d rather eat something
first? Sweep, of course. So Joseph swept. How about if Potiphar gives him money to go
buy fruit? Should he go buy the fruit
& bring it back, or should he take the money and use it to run away back
home to his father? Everyone agreed he
should buy the fruit. So he did. And Potiphar trusted him, and so even though
he was a slave, he was a lot happier than if he’d tried to get his own way.
So then we wound up by playing a
game about being faithful slaves. Kids
were paired up & the “master” had to tell the “slave” to do things like:
spread peanut butter on a cracker and feed it to the master, comb the master’s
hair, carry the train of the master’s long robe as he walked down the hall and
back…silly things, but fun.
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