The Lepers at the Gate – Going for Goals – making choices KS 1 &2

2 Kings 7

This is a story from the Old Testament of the Bible.
There were once 4 men who were very ill. They had a disease called leprosy, and that meant that no one wanted to come near them. They lived in a city called Samaria, which had a high wall all around it to keep it safe. When the men got ill the people in the city made them live outside the walls. They couldn’t earn their own livings so they had to beg for food from the people in the city as they went in and out through the gates. Sometimes people gave them food; sometimes they didn’t. It all depended how they felt. The men were very miserable.

Then one day war broke out. An enemy army came to Samaria. They wanted to capture the city and have it for themselves, so they didn’t want to damage it. They camped all around the city, a little way off, stopping anyone from going in or out of the city. Soon they knew that the people would be hungry, and they thought they would give in.

The people in the city ate all the food in their cupboards. Then they ate all the food in the shops. Then there was nothing left to eat. What could they do? They were all starving.

Meanwhile, outside the walls the men with leprosy were starving too. Now the people in the city didn’t have anything to give them even if they had wanted to. The men looked across at the enemy camp and wondered. If they stayed where they were they would starve to death. But if they went over to the enemy camp and surrendered perhaps they would get some food there. They had nothing to lose – no one in the city wanted them anyway. So they decided that they would creep across to the enemy camp that night when it was dark.

What they didn’t know was that on that night God had an idea too. God didn’t want the people of Samaria to starve, so this is what he did. In the middle of the night, when all the soldiers were in bed, he made them think that they heard a noise. It was the noise of marching feet. It was the noise of clashing swords and shields and spears. It was the noise of a great army, greater even than theirs. The soldiers sat up in bed. “What is that noise?” they all said. “It’s an army, coming to attack us!” And they all jumped out of bed, and ran out of their tents. There was nothing to see, but the noise was deafening. They took to their heels and ran. They ran and ran, as far away from the noise, and the city, as they could, leaving all their belongings just where they were.

The four men didn’t know about any of this, of course, so when they got to the camp, just as the sun was rising, they were very puzzled. Where was everybody? There were no soldiers on guard, and no one around at all. They looked in the tents. They were all empty. But the tables were piled high with food, and clothes, and weapons and armour, and gold and silver and everything anyone could ever want. The four men were overjoyed. They could eat and eat until they were stuffed. They could have more riches than they had ever dreamed of. And it was all for them, just the four of them. But just when they were about to start feasting on the food one of them stopped. “Wait a minute” he said. “What about all those people back in the city? They are hungry too? Shouldn’t we share this food and all these things with them? Perhaps we should go back to tell them what has happened?”

The four men stopped and thought. I wonder what they decided to do.
Talk about what the children feel about the choice the men had to make.

· What do you think they should do?
· Should they share the food, or eat it all themselves?
· Why might they have wanted to keep it all?
· People in the city hadn’t wanted to give them anything – why should they share now?
· What do you think?

The men did decide to go back to Samaria and tell the people what had happened. Then they all came and shared in the food, so everyone had some. The four men were brave and generous in doing this, and helped their whole community, even though their community had not treated them well.
Prayer: For help to think of others when we are making choices. Not just what is good for us, but what is good for everyone.

Nehemiah rebuilds the walls of Jerusalem - SEAL theme: Going for goals - persistence and hard work.

(From the book of Nehemiah in the Old Testament)

Needs: pictures of rebuilding work in Haiti (or rebuilding after some other disaster)

Once there was a man named Nehemiah. His family used to live in Jerusalem, but then an enemy army, the Babylonians, had come and defeated his people, and marched them across the desert many miles to their own country. There they had stayed for years and years, having to do whatever the Babylonians told them. Nehemiah had been born in that foreign land, but his parents had told him about the city of Jerusalem – how beautiful and strong it had been, with fine walls and gates to keep its people safe.

After a long time, there was a new king in that land, a kinder king, and he decided to let all Nehemiah’s people go home to their own land if they wanted to. Nehemiah, though, was one of the kings closest and best servants, so he stayed behind when the others left. Nehemiah wanted to see Jerusalem, but he knew the king wanted him to stay, and he had to do what the king wanted.

Then one day Nehemiah got a letter, a letter from his friends who had gone back home. He read it eagerly wanting to hear all about how beautiful Jerusalem was, but the more he read the sadder he felt. “Dear Nehemiah”, it said, “Jerusalem, our beautiful city, is in ruins. The walls have all been knocked down, the gates have been burned. People and animals come and go in and out of the city, just taking whatever they want and no one cares about it. We waited so long to come home, but there is no home to come to! Jerusalem is finished.”

Nehemiah was so sad. He didn’t know what to do. That day when he went in to serve the king, he tried very hard not to show how sad he was – he knew he mustn’t look sad in front of the king. The king didn’t want lots of long faces around him. But the king could see there was something wrong. “What’s wrong, Nehemiah?” he asked. Nehemiah told him about Jerusalem, how beautiful it had been and how it was all in ruins now.
“Well,” said the king, “then you must go back and sort it out. Rebuild the walls! Rebuild the gates! Make it safe and beautiful again! I can’t have my favourite servant sad like this.” And the king didn’t just send Nehemiah back, he also gave him all the things he would need – wood and stone – so he could do the job.

So Nehemiah went to Jerusalem. He felt much better now. He could sort it all out. He thought it would all be straightforward, but when he got there he found his problems were just beginning. It was much worse than he thought. The first night he was there, he got a donkey and rode all around the city – there was hardly any wall left - and everyone was tired and fed up, convinced there was nothing they could do. He went to the people in charge of the city and told them what he planned. You’ll never do it, they said!

“Yes I will, with God helping me” he answered, “and all of us working together.” He came up with a plan. Each family would rebuild a bit of the wall near them. If everyone did a bit, they would soon be finished.
They weren’t sure it would work, but they all set to work, and they all worked hard, and the wall began to grow. They thought they were winning, but then a dreadful thing happened.

Not everyone was pleased to see the walls getting higher. Some of the people who lived around Jerusalem didn’t want it to be strong. They wanted to be able to come and go into it, taking what they wanted from it. One day when the people came to work on the wall, they found they had an audience; their enemies had come to watch them and as they watched they kept making fun of them. “what a pathetic wall. It’s so low a fox could jump over it. You’ll never be able to build it high enough.” The builders looked at the wall, and it was true – it wouldn’t keep anyone out. They just felt like giving up. What was the point? Nehemiah had to work very hard to encourage them to keep going, but he did, and the wall kept growing.

Their enemies wouldn’t give up either though. Nehemiah started to hear reports that they were planning to attack the builders. The people were very frightened. Once again they felt like giving up. But once again Nehemiah gathered them together.

When you go out to work on the wall, he said, you must take a trowel in one hand, and a sword in the other. That way you can be ready if anyone attacks. Do whatever you have to, said Nehemiah, but whatever you do, don’t give up. And they didn’t give up, and the wall kept growing, higher and higher and higher.

And then one day they looked at the wall they had built, and they realised it was big enough, big enough to keep them safe inside its walls, big enough to keep their enemies out. It had gates that were strong, that they could close when they needed to. It was wonderful, and they couldn’t quite believe that they had done it, but somehow or other, the job was finished. They had all worked together. They hadn’t given up. And they had a great celebration, thanking Nehemiah, and most of all thanking God.

· I wonder what you think about that story – what would you have felt like if you were one of those builders. What helped them to keep going?
· It’s often easy to start a job, but it is really hard to keep going when things go wrong. People around us can encourage us. Sometimes we have to think of a different way of doing things.
· Show some pictures of Haiti (or the aftermath of a similar disaster) and of the work to rebuild there (A search for “Haiti rebuilding” in Google images will bring up plenty of pictures). Haiti had an earthquake a year ago. People have had to work hard and keep going in the face of illness and poverty, but together they are rebuilding.
· Pray for ourselves when we feel like giving up, and for the people of Haiti, that we would be able to keep going. Thank God that he is with us to help us. Pray that we would find people to encourage us, and that we would encourage others.

What's Christmas about?

It's that time of year again. Out come the nativity play costumes. Who's going to be Mary? What new slant can we take on the story this time...?

I can't answer those questions, but I recently did a staff training session at my local school on the meaning of the Christmas story to Christians. It is easy to find that the Christmas story becomes stale and trivialised, no more than a nice story to give us a bit of sparkle in the darkness of winter. But what did it mean to those who first told it (or rather "them, since there are two distinctly different stories in Matthew and Luke's Gospel - and none in Mark or John). And what does it mean to the grown-up Christians who cherish it still.

I produced a handout to go with the session I led - if it is any use to you, please use it.
It's called "Beyond the tea towels and the tinsel", and that is where I hope it will take us.

“You are the body of Christ” 1 Cor 13

N.B. This assembly is about the whole body working together. Be aware of the fact that some children in your assembly might have disabilities. Parts of their bodies might not work, or not work well. Be sensitive in the way you talk about what the body can do.

Song – I’ve got a body.

There was once a group of people who all wanted to live the way Jesus had taught them. They were Christians, some of the very first Christians, and they lived in a city called Corinth, in Greece. They had learned about Jesus because St Paul had travelled to Corinth and told them about him. They liked hearing stories about Jesus and they had each decided that they wanted to be Christians, so they came together to be one of the very first Christian churches – there wasn’t a building, but they all got together in each others homes, to eat together, pray together and help each other.

But there was a problem. They were all different from each other. Some of them were rich; some of them were poor. Some of them were men; some of them were women. Some of them were old; some of them were young. Some of them were slaves, who had to do what their bosses told them; some of them were the bosses and had slaves under them. Some of them had grown up, like Jesus and Paul, in Jewish families, hearing the stories of the Jewish people – Moses and Abraham and Joseph – and worshipping in Jewish ways with Jewish prayers. Others had grown up worshipping Greek and Roman gods and hearing stories about them.

They all had different ideas about the right way to live and the right thing to do, and they all thought that their way was the only way.

So they were always arguing. They could only see the world from their point of view – they were right and everyone else was wrong. They couldn’t work together on anything, because there would always be arguments. Instead of being friends, they were turning into enemies.

The leaders of the church were worried. What could they do? So they wrote a letter to St Paul and told him about it.

St Paul thought and thought. What could he write that would help them. Then he had an idea.

And this is what he wrote – we still have the letter – it’s in the Bible.

“Think about your body”, he said. “It’s got all sorts of different parts. It’s got feet. Feet are good.”
What can you do with feet?
It’s got hands. Hands are good.
What can you do with hands?
It’s got eyes…
A nose…

Just imagine, said Paul – and this is a bit silly – that your body was just a foot on its own. You were just one big foot. What use would that be? You could hop to places, but you couldn’t see where you were going or do anything when you got there.
Or just imagine an eye on its own – you could see everything, but you couldn’t go anywhere.
Imagine you were just a hand, or just a nose – wouldn’t that be silly?
(The children did indeed think this was very silly – “but if you were just an eye you would be rolling around all over the place…” they said. I think we miss the fun of St Paul sometimes…)

All the bits of our body do different things, but they are all important,. It’s no good the hand saying to the foot “you’re not as important as me.” They are just different, doing different jobs. If one bit of our body hurts – if our foot hurts, say - we feel sad all over.

So, said Paul. In your church you are all like a big body working together – the body of Jesus. Some of you might be like the eyes – you are good at noticing people. You see when someone is upset. Some of you might be like the feet or the hands – you are good at going out and doing something to help the people that the eyes have noticed. You all need each other BECAUSE you are different. If you were all the same, you wouldn’t be able to do all the things you need to.”

Paul wrote all that down in a letter, and he sent it off to Corinth. And the next time the people in that church got together the leaders read out the letter. And I wonder what happened. We don’t know the answer to that, because we haven’t got the letter they wrote back, but I hope they all looked at each other and realised that it was silly to fight over who was best, and who was right. I hope that they saw that each of them was important in a different way.

It’s the same in school isn’t it? Miss Smith is good at being the head teacher. Mr Wooding is good at mending things in the school. The cooks are good at making the dinners. You are good at learning things. I like coming in and telling you stories. If everyone does what they are good at, the school works well – but just imagine, if everyone tried to do everyone else’s job. I don’t know how good Miss Smith is at mending things, or cooking dinners… I might like coming in to tell you stories, but I wouldn’t want Miss Smith’s job – I don’t think I would be very good at it.

I wonder what you are good at. I wonder what your job is in school.
If we all do our job, and value the jobs that others do, we will have a happy school.

Let’s think about that for a while in silence. What are you good at and how can you use that to help others?

Prayer: Lord, help us to do the jobs we have to do in school and to notice the things others do and be grateful for them.

Ruth and Naomi – New beginnings – making someone welcome

The Book of Ruth – Old Testament.

I wonder if you’ve ever moved home and gone to live somewhere else.
· Talk about moving (sensitivity needed: children can move house for all sorts of reasons – family breakdown etc.) It can be exciting, but also strange being a new place, having to make new friends. The story I’m going to tell you is about two people who have to move home. It comes from the Old Testament of the Bible.

There was once a woman called Naomi. Naomi came from Israel, but she and her husband had had to leave their home because there wasn’t any food where they lived. They went to a different country called Moab, far from their home. When they got there it was very strange, but they settled down and they had a family – two fine sons. Their sons grew up and married girls who came from that land.
But then a terrible thing happened to Naomi. First her husband got ill and died, then both of her sons died too. There she was, in a land far from her home, with no one to look after her. The only people she really knew were her sons’ wives, but it wasn’t fair to expect them to care for her as she got old. They would probably marry new husbands.
Naomi decided she had better go back to Israel, where she had come from. She’d been away for a long time, but there would surely be relatives there she could stay with. She told her son’s wives that she was going back and started to say goodbye. She hoped they would make a new life for themselves.

But one of them, Ruth, looked very sad at this. “I can’t let you go back to Israel on your own,” she said “I will come with you. Where you go, I will go. Your people will be my people and your God will be my God.” And so she left all her family, her home, her friends, and she went with Naomi. It was a long journey, and when they got to the town Naomi had come from – Bethlehem – everything seemed very strange and foreign to her. Naomi hoped that someone from her family would invite them to stay, but no one did. What were they going to do? They needed to eat and they needed somewhere to live.

It was harvest time when they arrived. People were cutting the corn and bringing it in. In those days they didn’t have machines to cut the corn. It was all cut by hand using sharp knives. There was a custom that those who cut the corn shouldn’t cut right up to the edges of the field. If they missed a bit of corn here and there or dropped some, they should leave it. Then people who didn’t have any land of their own, who were poor, could come and pick it up and keep it for themselves. It was called gleaning. Naomi was too old to glean – all that bending down was too hard for her now. But Ruth went straight to the fields to see what she could gather. All day she worked in the hot sun, following the men who were cutting the corn. When dinner time came, and they all stopped, she kept going. While they were eating, the owner of the land, a rich man called Boaz came by to see how they were getting on.

He noticed the young woman working so hard. “Who is that?” he said. “That’s the woman who came from Moab with Naomi. She’s not one of us – she’s a foreigner – and the two of them are on their own here with no one to help them.” Boaz looked at Ruth, working so hard, and he thought she must be very brave and good to have come so far so that Naomi wouldn’t be on her own.

“Make sure you leave her plenty of corn to gather” he told the men, “and make sure you are kind to her and treat her well.”

Day after day Ruth gleaned in the fields, and Boaz watched her. Ruth told Naomi about the man who had been kind to her. Naomi was very happy to hear it because she knew that Boaz was a distant relative of hers as well as being a good man.
After a while Boaz realised that he couldn’t find a better person to marry than Ruth – someone who had shown how loyal and loving she was by the way she looked after Naomi. He and Ruth got married, and they had a son, called Obed.
And the Bible tells us that Obed had a son called Jesse, and Jesse had a son called David. I told you a story about David about a month ago. He was a shepherd boy but he became….(can you remember?)…the king of Israel.
Wasn’t it a good thing that Boaz welcomed Ruth and looked after her. Someone who was a stranger from a foreign land turned out to be really important.

Being somewhere new, or having someone new come to our class, can seem strange sometimes – we don’t like things to change – but we never know what is going to happen. A stranger can turn into a best friend, or teach us something important, or help us in some way. That’s a really good reason to make sure we make new people feel welcome. I

Pray: for all the people who have come new to Seal School this term. For all the new friends we’ve made.

St Michael – KS 1& 2 - Friends in high places - Being Brave - Seal Theme New beginnings - Autumn

Revelation 12.7-9

Yesterday was a special day for Christians. It was St Michael's Day. Some people call it Michaelmas (if you can lay your hands on some Michaelmas daisies you could show them.)

To understand the story of St Michael we need to think about one of these...
Show OHP picture of a dragon. (I managed to find one in Google images which was scary enough, without being absolutely terrifying!)

· What words can you think of to describe this dragon. (The children instantly said "scary")
Why are dragons scary? ( A wonderful child explained that "we are very small and they are very big and they might eat us!")
· Do you think it would be safe to get too close to him?

Dragons don't really exist, of course. They are made up, but people have often told stories about dragons as a way of thinking about things that are big and frightening.

In the Bible there is a story about a dragon.

A man called John was in trouble. A little while after the time of Jesus he had heard about him and decided to follow him. He became the leader of a church. It wasn’t like Seal church, a big stone building. It was just a small group of people getting together to pray and to try to live the way Jesus had taught them.

But it was a dangerous time to be a follower of Jesus. The Roman army ruled the land where John lived, and they didn’t like Jesus’ followers at all. They thought they were troublemakers. So one day soldiers came and arrested John. They didn’t put him in prison. Instead they sent him to an island, far out to sea, called Patmos, and they made him stay there. It was dry and dusty on the island, and John was very unhappy. He was especially unhappy because he knew that his friends were back in the land he’d come from, and that they would be missing him and be unhappy without him. He wanted to get back to them, but he couldn’t. When he thought about the Romans, who were very powerful and who ruled almost all of the world he knew, he couldn’t imagine that things would ever get better. Who could ever defeat such a great power? Everyone was scared of them. No one was strong enough.

But then John had a dream. In his dream he heard God calling to him. I’m going to show you something, John – you just watch. I know things look terrible now, but they won’t always be like that.
And John looked. And he saw, in the heavens, a great big dragon. He knew it wasn’t a real thing, but it stood for all the bad things that were happening – all the sadness in the world.
And then he saw God, like a king. Kings in those days always had armies of soldiers, so of course God, the great king, had to have an army too. His army was made up of angels – great big strong angels. And at the head of this good army was the biggest, best angel of the lot – he was called the archangel Michael, the leader of the angels.
And as John watched Michael started to fight with the dragon. There was a great battle in his dreams. But in the end, who do you think won? That’s right – Michael and the angels won, and the dragon – all those sad, bad things – were defeated.

And John thought again about the sad and bad things that had happened to him – the soldiers coming, the people back at home who were worried about him – and he realised that God was looking after him and them too, and that in the end, the good things in the world would be stronger than the bad things, just like in the dream. He knew too, that he had God and his angels on his side to help him.

Show OHP picture of St Michael killing the dragon (again, Google images is your friend...)
· Look at the picture of Michael and the dragon.
· If you were in trouble, I wonder who you would look up to to help you? (teachers, parents, big brothers and sisters...)
· Sometimes we are the ones who can help, like Michael.
· Perhaps if you knew someone was feeling sad, or being bullied, you could help them.

Prayer . Silence to think of the times when we feel as if we might be facing a dragon. Thank you for the story of Michael and the dragon. Sometimes bad things happen or we feel sad. Help us to remember that you are with us, and help us to remember that sometimes we can be like Michael, the one who helps others too.

Samuel chooses David - SEAL theme: New Beginnings - Being brave - KS 1 & 2

1 Sam 16: 1-13

This is the first time I’ve seen you this year. I wonder what this year will be like?
· What are you looking forward to this year? (Gather responses)
· What do you think might be difficult this year? (Gather responses - these included a YR child who was scared that planes would fly over the school and drop bombs on him... which is a reminder of what might be going on in the imaginations of the children we teach. He said it rather quietly to me, so I just acknowledged it without repeating it to the rest of the school, and made sure I had a word with his teacher afterwards. )

I’m going to tell you a story from the Bible about someone who found he had a difficult job to do

The people of Israel had a king to rule over them. He was called Saul. But Saul wasn’t a very good king – he wasn’t ruling the country well. God saw what Saul was doing and he decided that there should be a new king to take over from him.

So God spoke to the prophet, Samuel and told him that he was going to choose a new king. “Saul won’t like that!” said Samuel – “he’ll be really angry”. (A prophet was someone who listened to God’s voice and told people what God was saying.) So God said to Samuel, “Go to the house of a man called Jesse in Bethlehem. Tell him that you have come to worship God with him and his family. Jesse has some sons, and I want one of them to be the new king.” In those days, they didn’t put crowns on the heads of their kings. Instead they anointed them on the head with special oil, so Samuel took some of the special oil with him and set off.

When he got to Bethlehem he soon found Jesse’s house. He didn’t tell him that he was looking for a new king, though. He just told him to call for his sons, so that they could all worship God together. Jesse was very puzzled, but he trusted Samuel, so he did what he asked. Now Jesse had a lot of sons, and Samuel wondered how he would know which one God had chosen to be king.
The first of the sons came into the place where he and Jesse were. He was a big, strong looking man. “This looks like a fine young man,” thought Samuel. “He’d make a wonderful king, surely?” But just as he was about to go forward and put the oil on his head he heard God’s voice. “No, this isn’t the one - you can’t judge what someone is like by what they look like on the inside. I judge them by what their hearts are like, whether they are good people who will do the right things.”
So Samuel stayed where he was. The second son came in. He was very strong and handsome too –“ is it this one?” No”, said God. The third came in. He looked as big and tough as the others. “This one?” he asked God, quietly, but the answer was still no. One by one seven of Jesse’s sons came before Samuel, but each time he heard God say that this wasn’t the one he wanted to choose.
After the seventh came in, Samuel waited, but no one else came. “Is this all your sons?” he asked Jesse. “Are they all here?” , Well, said Jesse, “there is one more, but you won’t want to see him. He is just a boy, not big and strong like these others. I didn’t bother sending for him. He looks after the sheep for me – he’s not grown up enough to do anything else yet.” “Well,” said, Samuel, “you’d better send for him, because God has told me that all your sons need to be here before we begin.”

So Jesse sent for the youngest. It took a while, but someone went to fetch him, and, eventually in he came, just a boy, not at all sure why he’d had to come home. “This is David, my youngest son, said Jesse” He came before Samuel, and stood there, looking puzzled. But God’s voice in Samuel’s head said, “This one! This is the one I have chosen.” And Samuel got up and took the oil which he had brought with him, that special oil that was only used for making someone a king, and he poured it all over David. And from that day onward David knew that God had chosen him for a very special job. It was a long time – not till he was grown up – that he actually became king, but he knew that this was what God wanted, and that God would help him to be a good king. And when he became king, he was a very great king indeed. Who would have thought it? David the shepherd boy, king of Israel.

· I wonder what it would be like suddenly to find out that you were going to be king, like David? (The children all thought, from the responses I got, that it would be rather frightening, and they wouldn’t want to do it! I half expected that some might think it would be fun, but no one did.)
· It might sound exciting to be a king but it was a very difficult job to do as well – Saul wasn’t going to like it. But David turned out to be a good king, because he remembered that God was with him.
· When we thought about the things that might happen this year, some of them seemed exciting and some of them seemed difficult. When we wonder if we will be able to manage to do them, we can remember, like David, that God is with us to help us.

Prayer –think of something you are looking forward to and something you might find difficult this year. (Could ask the children to hold out one hand for the first thing and one for the second.) “Help us to remember that you are with us all the time.”