Christmas 2012

                I had Sunday the 16^th “off” again, thanks to Grace.  (Though I did lead the adult Bible study, which I enjoyed.)  She had chosen the story of the three wisemen for her theme, which I’m planning to do on Sunday the 30^th, but it doesn’t really matter.  Likely the kids won’t remember the subject matter anyway—sigh.

                So for Sunday the 23^rd we did the Luke 2 story.  First, though, we harked back to the main character of our last three stories together, named Joseph.  Said it was now time to meet another Joseph, from many, many years later.  This Joseph was very happy, because he was going to get married.  But then he found out his girlfriend was going to have a baby.  It’s not good to have a baby before you’re married is it?  No.  So Joseph didn’t really want to marry her then.  But when he went to bed that night (on a mat on the floor), an angel came and told him it was okay to marry her because God Himself had asked her to have this baby, and it would be God’s own Son.  Now He was asking Joseph if he was willing to take care of the baby and raise it as his own.  So Joseph said yes.  Then the last thing the angel said was to name the baby Jesus.

                 Here we took a little break to explain what the name Jesus (Yèh-Sòu in Cantonese) meant, which was God (Yèh-wòh-wàh) saves.  Each of the kids’ names have meanings too, and we had them all written out on star shapes, and explained them.  Some were very apt—like the tall, willowy girl whose name means beautiful and graceful; others were deeply meaningful—like the girl whose name meant to swim in grace(!); while some were a little funny—like the basically non-verbal, but constantly giggling boy whose name proclaims that his speech is refined and dignified!  For our craft, then, the kids cut out their star shapes, plus another yellow star shape with a precut X in the center.  After gluing the yellow stars on top of the name stars (on the points only, not the center!), they could fold out the points formed by the X and let their names show through.  Then we stuck them all to this big Christmas tree.

                Next—back to our story.  Mary and Joseph are now married, and they need to go to Bethlehem for some business Joseph needs to attend to.  The two walk around the room together & when the get back to the front, knock on the cupboard door.  They are told there is no room for them in the inn, so they end up in a stable (next to a picture of a cow & donkey taped to the side of the teacher’s desk).  They lie down together to go to sleep, but that night Mary has her baby.

                While they sit there admiring her baby, a couple of shepherds sitting in the back of the room next to a picture of sheep taped to the wall are visited by an angel who tells them there is good news, that God’s Son has been born in Bethlehem.  They go to see Him.  They go away rejoicing, and singing a song we adapted from our “God created…” song to the tune of Mary Had a Little Lamb.  One of the real carols that we’d learned would have been nicer BUT I only had bells for do through sol, so our options were limited.  After singing the song a few times, we passed out bells to the kids at their individual desks and worked with them on ringing them in the correct sequence as I pointed to them.  They weren’t perfect, but it got to sounding recognizable after several repetitions.  Unfortunately, when we tried to perform it during announcement time back in with the adults, it didn’t go so well.  They didn’t have the individual seats but were crowded together at the front desk, distracted both by each other and by the watching adults.  Sigh.  I think (I hope) the parents liked it anyway!

Joseph and his brothers are reunited

We began with a review of Pharaoh’s dream talking about the seven good years followed by the seven bad years.  So then started our story early in the bad years, which are being experienced in Canaan as well as down in Egypt.  Jacob (who’s getting pretty old by this time)

 

 sends all of his remaining sons except Benjamin down to Egypt to buy food.  To go down to Egypt in our new venue on the fourth floor, they all had to go down the elevator one floor, and then back up via the stairs.  Joseph recognizes them and gives them a hard time about being spies.  He gives them some food, but says if they ever want any more—and if they ever want to see this particular brother again,

 

they would have to bring their youngest brother to meet him.

                So, minus Simeon, they head back to Canaan: down the stairs to the third floor and back up the elevator.  Jacob is upset with the bargain they made, but eventually has no choice but to send Benjamin with his brothers, down the elevator & up the stairs…Simeon gets out of prison & Joseph plots how to get to keep Benjamin with him without revealing who he is.  He puts his cup in Benjamin’s bag of grain (actually sand; I figured hey, the kids aren’t fussy & this way I’m not risking spilling & losing pricey rice), and off the brothers go.  But before they get to the stairs, a servant (me) runs out and drags them all back to see who has stolen the cup.  Joseph says he must become his slave.  But then one brother says, please, our father loves his so much, it would kill him if he didn’t come back.  Please, take me for your slave instead and send him home.  Joseph was so happy to hear this.  His brothers had finally learned how to pursue things that make for peace!  So he tells them who he is, and tells them to bring their father back and settle in Egypt for the duration of the famine so that he can see they are all cared for.  So…down the stairs, up the elevator, grab Jacob, down the elevator up the stairs—and Jacob embraces his long-lost son.

                We talked about Joseph’s ups and downs again, and pointed out that if Joseph hadn’t gone down to Egypt, maybe he and his brothers would always have hated each other, but because of how it all happened, they are now friends again.  God wants all of us to have good relationships with our family members.  Each volunteer took one or two kids and prayed with them about their relationships with different family members that could be better.

                Then, since they’d already had a lot of exercise during the story, we did craft time before the game.  We made these paper-plate thingies (I don’t know what to call them) where you could turn the top plate and it would show through one hole, some needs we all experience (hunger, sickness, loneliness, need to know God), and through a second hole, the corresponding provision by God (food, doctor, group of friends, our church).  That was what it was supposed to mean, but our volunteer mom was interpreting it as, when we have this need, we meet it by…sigh.  Still made a nice craft, but not as related to the story.

                For our game we took our “grain”(/s of sand), and had a relay race by which the kids had to take small cupfuls (cut-down paper cups) at a time to see who could fill up their team’s tall glass first.  (It was a tie)

Joseph's Ups and Downs

I didn’t write up anything for November 25 because I didn’t have to lead the children’s session, woo-hoo!  Grace graciously substituted for me.  But then last week, back to me again.  We continued with the story of Joseph in Egypt.

                We introduced a new Bible verse, “God helps me, I will not be afraid.”  To illustrate the point, we had the kids walk on a small balance beam, which they all did just fine.  Glad I was prepared with a blindfold!  Also glad all the kids were willing to wear it.  We’ve had some fussing about blindfolds in the past, so in an activity I forgot to report last time, I had tried simply placing a paper bag over their heads.  No way, not one kid would keep it on!  But they all tolerated the mask-type blindfold today.  And they all found they did not want to try walking the beam blindfolded without someone holding their hand.  Application being, it’s a lot less scary if someone is holding your hand.  And God is willing to hold your hand through every scary thing, if you will let Him.

                God held Joseph’s hand through all his scary times too.  Even though he was a slave in Egypt, God helped him and his master trusted him completely (he gets a gold star).  Then one day, the master’s wife wanted him to do something he knew the master wouldn’t like.  He refused.  The wife begged, Joseph continued to refuse because it was wrong.  Finally the wife says, you will regret this!  So when her husband gets home, she tells him that he wanted to do this wrong thing but she stopped him.  The master believed his wife and had Joseph thrown in prison (twine “fetters” around ankles).  In prison, did Joseph lose his temper or decide that God didn’t love him anymore?  Nope.  He remembered that we are always happier if we pursue the things that make for peace, so that’s what he did in prison.  He might help wash the windows, or bring water to the other prisoners, or comfort those who were unhappy.  So even in prison he was trusted (second gold star), and sure enough, that made it nicer for him too. 

                One day two of the other prisoners had some dreams and Joseph was able to tell them what they meant.  He told one of them that in three days he would get out of prison and go back to being the king’s servant.  Joseph asked him to tell the king that he was stuck in prison for something he didn’t do.  The man said he would—but then he forgot.  Only several years later, when the king had a dream he wanted to understand, did the man remember Joseph.  So they took him out of the prison and had him wash his face and comb his hair.  The king told about how he saw seven fat cows (picture of fat cow walked back & forth across the front of the room seven times), and then seven skinny cows (picture of skinny cow does seven passes).  Then the skinny cows ate the fat ones (fat cow picture covered by skinny cow) but they looked just as skinny as ever.  Joseph explained about this meaning seven years of plenty followed by seven years of famine, and suggested that the king appoint someone to take care of arranging for food for the seven bad years.  The king says, I’ll appoint you, because I’ve never met anyone so smart!  Joseph gets a royal medallion to place around his neck.

                We reviewed the story’s highlights and lowlights, and then we all worked together to set up a game about the alternating ups and downs of Joseph’s life.  When you’re “up” you walk tall with your back straight; when you’re “down” you walk kind of hunched over.  So we had two rows of eight desk/chairs facing each other. Each pair was labeled with one of the ups & downs of his life.  For the “ups” we taped string from one seat to another; for the “downs” we taped string from one desktop to another.  Then each kid had to go through the obstacle course, walking tall over the lower “up” strings, and crouching to go under the higher “down” strings.  The last up string, though, was taped between desktops, because it was the biggest up, Joseph becoming the #2 leader of Egypt.  We practically had to lift our shortest girl to get her leg up that high, but she made it!

  We ended up doing puzzles made out of skinny cow pictures that could fit over the fat cow pictures glued to the bottoms of the puzzle frames.

              

Joseph is carried away to Egypt

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.