The Road to Emmaus

We didn’t depict the resurrection as we have done 2 out of three Easters in the past. Instead, we introduced two nameless friends walking home from Jerusalem a few days after Jesus’ death. One was saying to the other how the last few days seemed like a bad dream. Then a third person, in a jacket with a hood, came up & asked what they were talking about. They said, it’s a long story, we’d better sit down (the Bible doesn’t have them sitting down, but I figured we’d never get through all this with our three main characters standing up). First of all, one asks the stranger, “Have you ever heard of Jesus?” and our “Jesus” answered without any prompting, “Yes, I’ve heard!” Well, then, you know that he did many mighty miracles, like, remember the time there was that big storm on the lake? (someone stands up and waves a large blue sheet of paper up & down). Jesus just told the waves to be still, and they were still! (someone else stands up, makes a “Time Out” gesture, and the wave-waver stops). He also had great teaching. My friend & I here used to argue a lot, but Jesus taught us about forgiveness and now we are very good friends (the two shake hands). We thought sure He was going to be the promised Savior, but then just a few days ago, they killed Him on a cross. (someone is given two sticks and has to make them into a cross to show everyone). Well, then this morning, though, some women went to the tomb and it was open, and they saw an angel who told them Jesus had risen! (girl in halo “flies” around the room saying, Jesus is risen!). Now, I ask you, is this all hard to believe, or what?

But the stranger says, you guys don’t know your history very well, do you? They say, what? He explains how many prophets predicted that the Messiah would suffer, die and rise again—holding up three different papers reading: David—prophesied 1000 years ago; Isaiah—prophesied 700 years ago; Zechariah—prophesied 500 years ago. They say, this is so fascinating, we want to hear more! And so they invite Him to have dinner with them.

So they set up a table with dishes and a loaf of bread. Jesus lifts the loaf up to give thanks and the sleeves of His jacket fall back, revealing the nail scars in His wrists (which the narrator drew on the spot). They say, You are Jesus! He says, that’s right! He gets up and says, “Eat slowly” (a typical Chinese saying when one person leaves the table before others), and then leaves. The friends are so excited they don’t eat slowly; instead they get up and rush back to Jerusalem to tell the disciples that Jesus is truly risen, they have seen Him. And of course the disciples say, we know, we have seen Him too! So everyone rejoices together.

Since, in our story, the friends recognized Jesus by his hands, our game was supposed to be having the kids recognize their moms by seeing their hands sticking out through the door. But because we had a special longer meeting for the adults this week, the moms weren’t available during game time. So each child had a partner they were supposed to recognize by their hands. But it didn’t work very well. The “hiders” didn’t quite get the idea of leaving their hands sticking through the door long enough, and the “seekers” weren’t highly motivated.

Oh well, at least the craft was VERY popular! We made “Easter bonnets” from paper plates & paper bowls plus a few trimmings, this year including cake doilies, which really made them cute!

The Rich Man and Lazarus

We started the Beatitudes right after Chinese New Year, but then we had this one week before doing Easter, so we went back and did this one more parable, which illustrates to some extent the Beatitudes—the blessed one in this story was the one who was meek and mournful in life.

We first introduced our Rich Man, dressed in a red suit jacket, sitting down to a meal featuring photos of chicken, fish & veggies (a good Chinese meal) and a bottle of wine. We said he had a wall around his house to keep unsavory types from getting too close, & put up a “wall” made of large pieces of cardboard joined together. Lazarus the beggar (in a torn shirt) sat outside the wall hoping to receive alms from the rich man. But when he left his house (my embroidery again!), he would purposely go out another way to avoid passing Lazarus—from behind his wall he went into one bedroom which connects with bedroom two which connects to the living room well on the other side of the wall.

Lazarus wished he could eat some of the rich man’s leftovers, which a servant scraped off the plates into a wastebasket which he set outside the wall. But when he tried to get some out of the garbage, the servant threw stones at him, wounding him (I know, lots of embroidery here, just trying to be more visual). The dogs (boy in a dog mask) would come and lick his wounds.

Well, poor Lazarus was pretty miserable, but believe it or not, God loved him very much. When he died, two angels (men in halos) picked him up and carried him off to heaven, where Abraham (in long white beard) fed him grapes (or at least he started off that way but then pulled down his beard and ate some himself) and water (I know, I know, but I just couldn’t see having Lazarus nestled up to Abraham’s bosom…)

Then the rich man died and was escorted to “hell” (large box with flames on the side) by a wicked-looking masked lady. The instructions at this point called for the rich man to kneel in the box, but our rich man ended up being the boy who doesn’t know how to kneel, so someone got him a stool.

He begs Abraham to have Lazarus dip his finger in water and send him over to cool his tongue. Abraham says, sorry, it’s impossible to cross from here to there. The rich man says, okay, I know, I was a selfish sinner and don’t deserve anything anyway. But could you send Lazarus to my brothers who are still living? I don’t want them to end up in hell like me! Abraham says, let them learn from the Bible how to be saved. No, they won’t read it, but if someone rose from the dead, then they would listen. Abraham holds up a drawing of the resurrected Christ appearing to the women on Easter morning and says, lots of people won’t believe even if someone rises from the dead; it’s whether their hearts are willing to listen or not. (So this also made a nice bridge to Easter…)

For a game the kids had to dip straws in water and close them off with their fingers, then carry them to the next person in line and empty the water into their mouths. Most of the kids didn’t quite get the covering-the-straw bit, but we discovered it worked well enough if they pinched it & then carried it back to the line upside down. Some drips, of course, but it turned out fun.

For craft time we talked about everyone being invited to heaven’s banqueting table if they are willing. Then we made these little “banquet tables”, with four dowel legs blu-tacked to a cardboard table top, a white tablecloth, fancy place settings from the internet that we made into stickers, and little fabric flowers for just a few cents each also stuck on with blu-tack. (Love that stuff and love double-sided tape!)

Blessed are the Persecuted

To illustrate this final beatitude, we returned to a story in Acts, where Peter and John are imprisoned briefly for daring to heal a lame man in the name of Jesus. First we introduced Peter & John, who were going to the temple to preach. We put up a picture of the temple (this lovely one that I found online somewhere), and then the story said two adults were supposed to carry the “lame beggar” to sit in front of it. But our beggar didn’t want to be carried, so she walked to her place—hm, shades of charlatanism? ;-) Then Peter & John come along & demonstrate by pulling their pockets inside out that they had no money to give him. However, in Jesus name they could give him healing, so they did!

The lame man was very happy and was jumping around praising God. But then along came the priests (in neckties as we didn’t have enough priestly robes for them all) who were NOT happy with Peter & John giving credit to Jesus for the healing. So they haul them off to prison.

The prison was nasty: cold, damp, and there were RATS! At this point we threw a couple of our cat’s toy mice at the prisoners’ feet and they “eeked” most convincingly!

The next day, a guard brought them out and the priests asked them again how they did this healing, and again they said it was in the name of Jesus. Some of the priests wanted to kill them, but they couldn’t deny the miracle, so they let them go with threats (guard grabs them by collars). They go back to the other believers and praise God that all they had to do was spend one night in prison. But some of the believers said, it might be worse next time! But they said, that’s okay, it’s a privilege to suffer for Jesus and show Him how much we love Him! Then they got to their knees and prayed, “God, give us Your courage.”

Years ago when we did this story, game time consisted of everyone getting to ride this “bouncy horse” that I borrowed from the daycare center. But the center is packing to move & we couldn’t find the horse anywhere. However, we had these huge garbage bags at home, big enough for my regular therapy ball. Using the mouth of the bag for a handle, the ball was big enough for adults or kids to ride and shout “Praise the Lord” at the same time.

Craft was “Peter and John in prison.”

Blessed are the Peacemakers

Unfortunately, to be a peacemaker, you have to first have an “unpeaceful” relationship. We gave the example of twin brothers Jacob and Esau, how Jacob was always tricking his brother out of stuff. (They sit down next to each other with bowls of food, Jacob points and says look, and when Esau looks he quick scoops some of Esau’s food out of his bowl.) Esau got so mad at him for all his trickery that he wanted to kill him (our Esau made great threatening gestures toward Jacob on cue), so Jacob had to flee to his ancestral village. Does anyone remember what he did there? He got married and had LOTS of kids, right? We lined up his two wives and two concubines and filled their arms with paper-towel-roll “children” according to number. He also multiplied flocks and herds (hang pictures of flocks of sheep and goats on wall). But even though everything was going fine, and his relationship with his brother wasn’t very good, he still missed home, so he decided to go back.

He sent a servant to tell Esau he was coming, and Esau took some armed men to come greet him! When the servant came back and told this to Jacob, he was very afraid. So he prayed and asked God what to do. (He kneels down & an “angel” comes and taps him on the head with an idea). So what he does is send one servant ahead with one (picture of a) flock of sheep, and another with a (picture of a) flock of goats, as gifts for his brother. Then, just in case this didn’t help, he lined up his wives & children in order of least-loved to most-loved, so in case anyone got killed, maybe the ones to the rear—including himself—would be spared. (The parents thought this was very funny.) But everything is all right because Esau is very moved by the fact that instead of stealing something from him, Jacob sends him gifts—he’d never gotten a gift from his brother before! So when they finally meet, they embrace. (They actually did this, it looked so sweet; I wish I’d had my camera out & ready!)

For our game we said, Jacob was going out to meet Esau, and Esau was going out to meet Jacob. Not that they had a specified meeting place, but we pretended there was and asked, “who will get there first?” We had a long (about 20 feet) piece of twine, taped to the floor in the center. The kids played in pairs, with one “Jacob” and one “Esau.” Each had a small dowel & the object of the game was to roll up the string on the dowel until you got to the tape, and see who would get to the tape first. We had some very fussy, neat rollers, and some very messy rollers, but it was all good fun.

Our craft was these very simple “Doves of Peace.” As you can see, some of our kids are better at cutting than others.

A relatively short story today to illustrate this beatitude. First we introduced King Saul & reminded everyone we’d seen him last week as Israel’s first king. Now we were jumping ahead several hundred years. Saul is already dead (crown off, pushed down into chair), and the kingdom of Israel is on its last legs. We introduce the prophet Jeremiah (in red robe), who has been trying to tell Israel to mend its ways to avoid disaster, but they continue disobedient.

So one day, Jeremiah gets a word from God (delivered by angel in halo) that he is supposed to invite the family of the Rechabites over to his home to drink some wine. So he does. (Someone gave us a bottle of wine years ago as a gift. Since we’re non-drinkers, it’s just sat around & probably has turned to vinegar by now—a Macau kitchen is no wine cellar! But it makes a handy prop from time to time so it hasn’t been wasted!)

But they refuse to drink the wine. Not because it tastes vinegary, hah! But because generations ago, one of their ancestors made a vow that his descendants would not drink wine, and this vow has never been broken. Jeremiah tries to press them, & they finally get up and leave.

Jeremiah asks God why he was supposed to invite them for a drink if they didn’t drink. The angel returns and tells him that they are an example that Israel would have done well to follow. Generations ago one ancestor makes one vow and they are still obedient today. While God speaks to His people over and over and they still don’t obey! Oh that Israel was as pure in heart as the Rechabites! Though Israel is doomed to destruction, God would surely bless the Rechabites (angel goes & finds each Rechabite, shakes their hands and says to each, God bless you.)

Just as God seeks those with pure hearts, so in our game we sought pure hearts—pure milk chocolate hearts, that is! We had three cups, put a heart under one, and then mixed them up while the kids watched, one at a time. If they concentrated their attention, they got rewarded by being able to guess which cup the heart was under, and got their chocolate. Played until everyone had won once.

And what is purer than snow, right? So for craft we made these snow globes, which were actually a lot prettier than the pictures turned out. I had bought coarser glitter than I usually do, thinking it would be more fun to watch fall as snow, but it wasn’t a good idea. It actually fell more slowly than the fine stuff; a lot of it wouldn’t even fall at all but stayed floating on the top of the globes, which detracted somewhat from the overall effect (nasty stormy snowclouds?) Turned out I had bought just enough little Christmas-y figurines when I was in the US, for one for each kid!

BLessed are the Merciful

Finally got a couple of pictures today. Simply had to, as this is one of my favorite stories in our series.

We first introduced Israel’s first King, Saul, complete with crown and fancy paper robe. Unfortunately, he was not a real good king, so after a little booing and hissing we had one of the kids stick a big masking-tape ‘X’ on his chest. Saul had a loyal servant named David, who was a much more godly man. Applause, and then we had another child make a star out of masking tape for his chest.

David fought battles for Saul (runs around room poking at people with his foam sword), and then would hand over the spoils to the king (gives moneybag to Saul, who was disappointed to discover that the money was inedible…). So, did Saul love David? Well, he did at first but then he became quite jealous of him, and wanted to kill him! Saul stands up and yells, Kill him! So David and his men had to flee. They need some food for the journey, so they stop and visit the priest (man in red shawl), who gives them a bag of bread. They continue running and finally hide in a cave (in the bathtub, behind the drawn shower curtain).

Now Saul and his men are in hot pursuit. They get as far as the priest’s and ask if he has seen him. The priest says yes, and I gave them some food for their journey. Saul says, kill him! A flash of the sword and the priest falls over dead. They keep running around looking for David. Finally, Saul has to go to the bathroom! He goes into a cave for privacy—the very cave in which David is hiding!

The three inside the tub discuss whether this is God’s opportunity to kill Saul, but David won’t do it. He reaches out from behind the curtain (took a teeny bit of persuasion to keep him from opening the curtain) and cuts a corner off his paper robe. Saul finishes his business and heads back out to seek David. David comes to the door of the cave, waves the corner of the robe and says, look, Saul! I could have killed you, but I didn’t! Saul apologizes, and stops chasing David.

The instructions for this week’s game made the leader laugh out loud: since we don’t want our kids chasing anyone around with scissors, our game will not involve trying to cut pieces off anyone’s clothing. :-) Instead, we will just try to grab clothespins off someone’s clothing. The kids lined up on stools, shoulder to shoulder—they were supposed to stay put on the stools, but it did get a little rowdy, oh well. One of the adults donned a jacket with about 25 clothespins all over it, and scurried back and forth along the line while the kids grabbed for the pins. We played it twice, the second time with a usually very timid mom as the volunteer. She did great, running as fast as she could and even hiding one of the clothespins under her arm. :-)

For the craft, our teenage leader did a very good job of explaining that the Bible mentions that David actually regretted his merciful act of cutting off part of Saul’s robe as not being merciful enough! Perhaps if he would have had the chance, he would have sewn the piece back on for Saul. He didn’t have that chance, so we will do that for him! Everyone got a “garment” with a corner cut off; the fabric was loosely woven enough so that they could use relatively blunt darning-type needles to repair the corner with yarn. When we did this years ago, I had actually sewn up “three-dimensional” garments with seams. I dreaded having to do that again this year when I realized, duh, just one layer in garment shape is fine, no one is going to complain! So here’s how they turned out:

Blessed are Those Who Hunger and Thirst after Righteousness

Still not managing to get any pictures these days, sigh. Our story for this beatitude was taken from the book of Acts. First, though, we have Jesus stand up and say, “Go and Preach the Gospel.” Two of those who respond to the call are Paul and Silas, whom we identify with large crosses hung around their necks. As they are going around preaching, they come to a city called Thessalonica. A man named Jason invites them into his home (serves them tea). The next morning they go to the synagogue, and present the gospel from a Jewish perspective. They remind them how the Passover commemorates the escape from Egypt (stick the word for Passover up on the board), when every household had to kill a lamb and put its blood on the lintel and doorposts. (Stick a large paper “door” on board, have a volunteer come up & brush red paint on top & sides). That now, God has sent His Son Jesus to be the eternal Passover Lamb (hold up crucifixion picture), and we are saved by his blood shed for forgiveness of sin. Most of the people laughed at them, though one or two believed (they get cross stickers). After a little while the unbelievers decide that chasing Paul & Silas out of the synagogue isn’t enough; they should find them and have them punished. But they can’t find them (they are behind the display easel), so instead they grab Jason, their host, and drag him before the judge (man in long black robe). The judge takes some money from him & lets him go. Then the believers find Paul & Silas & suggest they head to the next town, which they do. They go to Berea, and preach the same message in the synagogue, complete with paint applied to a fresh door, and the crucifixion picture. But this time, the response is different. The Bereans are truly hungering and thirsting after righteousness, so they search the Scriptures to see if it is really true. One of them finds and reads Isaiah 53:6—“All we like sheep have gone astray; we have all turned to our own way, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” They are excited at this wonderful truth & everyone stands up and sings “All Praise to Jesus.”

“Happy” are those who hunger and thirst…for our game we had a relay race involving each team cracking and eating its way through bowls of pistachio nuts, which are translated “happy nuts” in Cantonese because they look like little smiles.

For craft we related the beatitude to hungering after things that are good for you, such as fruit and vegetables rather than ice cream and coke. We made simple “refrigerators” from folded paper with shelves drawn in, and everyone got veggie stickers to put on their shelves.