Are you tired?

I was feeling tired, though not physically. And the question wasn't actually directed to me. But it energised me enormously. 

For months I have been co-leading a group. I've been telling stories to a group of children I couldn't quite reach. For some of them, my first language is their second, and that doesn't help. But I've also struggled with asking the right questions. For some of them, the goal was to answer the question 'correctly', and fair enough, that is often the goal. But not mine, and this was frustrating me. 

-What's your favourite part of this story? 

-Everything. 

-Which part was the most important?

-All of it. 

-How did this person feel? 

-Happy, because they love God.

How did I feel? 

Frustrated.

The ones who were keen to come in with these answers were effectively blocking anyone else from having any input. They were Jesus Juking everyone. And their answers were 'right', but not right.

Yesterday I told the story found at the start of Acts 6. The short version goes: the church was growing, the apostles couldn't do all the things anymore, so they appointed other leaders, like Stephen. 

I put out the first church that we had constructed when looking at the end of Acts 2, and talked about how the apostles knew they were to concentrate on prayer and teaching, so there were other jobs that other people needed to do.

I had wondered for a few days what I could wonder that would not close the conversation down. I tried a couple of things. And then I asked:

I wonder what question you would like to ask the first church.

So. Many. Questions. The wondering went on for ages, and I wish I could remember all the questions. I think everyone asked at least two. How did they have enough food? What if some people were saying they trusted Jesus but didn't really, they just wanted the free food? How did you have enough room? What if you didn't all speak the same language? Are you tired? 

The one who asked that last one was asking the question that belonged in the story a few weeks back. If the church met every day, and they were looking after each other, and doing all these things... were they tired? 

What did I learn from the children today? Sometimes the answers are in the questions. 

And that I am less tired now that I was before she asked that question. 

Wait, what?

As someone who has read the bible through a few times, and has a reasonable (but imperfect!) grasp of what happens where, and when and why, the big danger for me is no longer being affected by some of the details. 

Over the last two weeks, we have looked at Peter and John in the temple in Acts 3-4. Last week we had the healing of the man who had never been able to walk. This week, Peter and John were called to account for their actions. The temple officials told them off for teaching about Jesus. 

Wait. What? 

From the perspective of the kids in front of me, who KNOW that Jesus is God, why were these people who know God, not wanting people to speak about Jesus. 

When you know something, it's really hard to understand people who don't know something, or know something different. 

What was surprising for you about this story?

That the temple officials didn't want Peter and John to speak about Jesus. 

What did I learn from the kids today? 

That while I know things about God, I can sometimes forget God. Losing that shock, the outrage at the injustice of the persecution, that clear knowledge that this is not okay... Losing that is too big a loss. They taught me that I must hold on. 

Is there going to be story about Jesus?

Yesterday I was listening to a podcast, in which two women were discussing books they had read recently. One was talking about a book that had chronicled a woman's journey with IVF, and all the complicated emotions that brought. The reviewer commented that it was a pretty raw account, including a lot of the doubt that is often not found in books like these: the feelings of wanting to focus on her career instead, and the guilt that came with that.

The podcaster's colleague asked if the woman ended up having a baby, and said that she sort of hoped she didn't. Because her experience was that often in situations where you kind of decide that everything will be fixed if I can just ... rarely worked out well. It often, in her experience, ended in depression. 

A little later in the morning, I was at church, taking the kids to another room to tell them a story. One of them said: 'Is there going to be a story about Jesus?'

Re-read that line. Read it with the same tone you'd find in 'did you really buy me a shiny new car for my birthday?' The session proceeded in the same way: here was a kid who was so hungry for Jesus. He just wanted more. In the end, I told the story I'd brought, then another one, and then read some more bible to him. He has a pretty difficult life in some ways, and had, at the age of 10, identified that he needed Jesus in his life. 

Later as I was reflecting on my day, filtered through the lens of various social media... it occurred to me. When I was about 20, there was a strong message within Christianity, that if you were discontent, if you had a deep longing for something, it was actually probably God who was the only thing that could fill that emptiness. 

But I don't hear that so much anymore. I hear that we can basically do all the things we want in order to meet the needs that we think God put in us. Feel like you are not the biological sex you were born? Fine! Feel like you are same-sex attracted? Fine! I'm sure there are others. And we now have the technology, and the political power to be whoever we want to be. And recreate God in our image.

What happened to the knowledge that our deepest desires were met in Jesus?

Why are we Christians not even telling ourselves that?

Why does it take an atheist book reviewer to remind me of that?

Is there going to be a story about Jesus?

Draw near to God

I had a very chatty 17 kids in my group this morning. I reckon all of them wanted to share their life story with me, all at the same time. It was a fairly loud start to the morning. Oh, and four of them were choosing to be not in the group. While still wanting to engage. I haven't quite figured those out yet. Maybe that's a blog post for another day. 

On the one hand, it could have become extremely frustrating. I had Things I Wanted To Do. But I had to try to create a group first, and not 19 individuals competing for the right to speak. 

So, I started with a listening exercise: everyone has to talk to their partner for one minute, without stopping. It's really hard. Impossible, actually. Your brain wants to hear the other person, and actually stops you talking. 

I think they got it... but they still had a million things to say. 

So we played Telephone, you might know it by another name. I whisper something to the person next to me, and it gets passed around the circle until it is completely unrecognisable by the end. Hilarity ensued. 

And then the noise started again. 

I worked hard, and we got to tell the story. Which was fun. And chatty.

I had two options for prayer: and one was silent. Yeah, no. The other one is an empty chair activity. See this circle on the ground? Imagine God is there: what are we going to say to him? What things can we say to God, to tell him how awesome he is? 

I started, one or two joined in, everyone else followed. It was loud. I'm sure that some of it was not even relevant. But a lot was. Definitely the majority. 

As the praying slowed to almost quiet, I reached in with my hand toward the circle, so my fingertips were just touching it, and started to pray 'Father God...'

And suddenly, there were hands all round the circle, just touching it, just like mine. 

It was the most beautiful thing. And there was quiet for a moment, while I prayed. 

While we all drew near to God.

Very Good Friday

I took the kids from my church on a walk on Good Friday. We visited the place where the shepherds were visited by the angels the night Jesus was born, we went up to Bethany to see Jerusalem in the distance on Palm Sunday. We ate a (very tiny) meal in the upper room. We went to the garden where Jesus prayed, and saw the cross where Jesus died. And we saw the tomb, empty of bodies

It was quite the walk, really. Obviously it relies heavily on an ability to imagine things. And to be drawn in to a story. But since it is a rather excellent story, that bit is easy. I told these kids a story they had all heard before. And I received a lot from the kids that day.

We carried stones with us on our walk. Stones that were smooth, but had rough bits. Stones that weren't heavy, but perhaps if there were many of them, they would be. Stones that weren't heavy, but they were annoying to keep carrying. Stones that were quite black. We finished the walk with a prayer, while holding stones, which were then put in a bucket in the tomb. I wasn't as direct about it as I could have been...

Father God, thank you for everything Jesus has done for us throughout his life:
A life that started in Bethlehem as a baby, visited by shepherds;
And ended with his journey to Jerusalem and his death on the cross
Thank you Father that he took the punishment for all our sins
And thank you that he beat death by rising again.
And we remember our part in the story
We remember that we are people who sometimes do things that hurt you, and hurt others. And we are sorry.
We bring those things here, and we leave them here with you. Amen.

An older girl was looking after a younger girl. They both love to talk, and have lots of very good thoughts to share. They're quite similar in some ways. They were talking (just for a change, though I expect it was on topic) when I was wrapping up the story at the tomb, but the older girl worked out what they'd missed, and invited the younger girl to 'put her sin in the stone'. The older girl told me about this later, and said that (her younger friend) had taken some time about this: nearly there, almost, yes, that's all of it.

I love that kids listen and learn even when we don't think they are.
I love that kids are ministering to one another: and I loved the directness of her language.
And I love that we all took something home from the tomb that is not the same as what we left there.

I wonder what I brought home that needed to be left. And what I left that I needed to bring.

Physics

I was listening to a podcast today about ... well, the section I was listening to was about teaching Physics. And what caught my attention was the discussion of how some physics teachers (and university lecturers) had changed their way of teaching by listening to their students. They had learned up. And I got quite excited, because I realised that it might answer part of a question that has been bugging me for ages. 

I am a cautious consumer of the 'kids talk' in church, and my own versions of them never looked like the standard model, because I couldn't work out how to do Part 1. 

The standard model is in two parts:

1. Very exciting thing that seems to have nothing to do with anything, except it has awesome props, lots of colour and movement, generates laughs, and is the Thing That You Will Remember.

2. The bible bit, which is calm and serious, has no props, very little colour and movement, definitely no laughs... and probably is forgotten.

The transition between parts 1 and 2 is the bit that would cause me to cringe. You might have heard these talks. You can feel it coming, and it doesn't feel good. Even the best presenters on occasion would fall into this. And you can see the kids' reactions, too. They know it's coming. You can watch them switch off, as soon as they know the good bit is over. 

Hard.

Anyway. What I learned from the physics teachers was this: people walk into a learning opportunity with a preconceived idea about stuff. If you give an example, tell a story, do an experiment, mostly it will simply reinforce their preconceived idea about stuff. Perhaps the wrong one, but it doesn't tend to change the way they think. 

One guy asked his class a question, took a poll on the answers, then allowed the class to talk amongst themselves for a time. Then he re-polled, and more like 90% of the class got the answer right. 

This is probably old news for most people, and I'm sure I've heard it before. But it got me thinking. If kids walk into church with a preconceived notion of (eg) who God is, and we tell them a regular story about our trip to the zoo, it will simply reinforce their preconceived idea. And if we then follow this with 'and that's exactly what the bible says here'... well, this will work if we were all on the same page to start with. 

What if we weren't? 

My preconceived idea that I had before I listened to this podcast was that bible stories are powerful and don't need dressing up or para-parables to make them accessible, and this podcast just helped reinforce that idea. 

I wonder what kids ministry would look like if we were all brave enough to throw away the 'exciting' stuff, the examples from our own lives, the lecturing model, and just tell the story, and ask the kids to discuss it. 

I wonder what our own lives would look like if we were this brave.

The Parable of the Not-Wanted-To-Be-Lost Sister

We are reading through Luke, me and my two girls. We got a bit stuck on the Parable of the Lost Son. I know I got stuck on it as a kid: why did the younger son get to be a pain, and then when he came back he was showered in love, and there was a party and how unfair for the older brother... Actually, I still get a bit stuck on that as an adult.

- Mummy, I don't exactly get this. Can you re-tell it in a way that's more relevant to me?
- Sure. Maybe tomorrow, when I've had a chance to think about it...

"There was once a mummy who had two daughters. The younger one said to her mother, 'Mummy, I want all my stuff, right now.'

So the mummy divided all she had between them. It wasn't long before the younger daughter had packed up all her stuff and gone far away..."

- NO!
- What's wrong?
- I don't want my little sister to run away!

And suddenly I could see the Father's response, and it made perfect sense. And I could see the older brother's response, and it was jarring.

I wonder... what if the younger brother had heard his brother say 'I don't want my little brother to run away'.
I wonder how I can be a better older sibling.