Child's Play

I had my first children's session on Sunday morning. Surprisingly, it went surprisingly well! I had planned and pre-planned the morning, and everything went according to plan - although I was supported superbly by a brilliant, versatile and gifted team of serving team members. In total, we had sixty children - which is two-thirds of all the names on our book. Being primary school age there is a wide range of attention span and ability from the youngest to the oldest, so my concern was the pace and variety of the morning - would it captivate them enough? But at the end, a couple of the older children who I've known since birth came up to me really appreciative. Although I am realistic: this could be just because they'd received a Chupa-Chup lolly and colouring sheet! The mercenary nature of children is something that I am not unaware of...

Highlights for me included:

• Naughty Connect 4 - our discipline aid. Each time someone breaks one of our rules, a counter goes in (green for boys, yellow for girls - apparently boys are darker!!!). Whoever has the least counters gets said lolly at the end of the morning. The kids seemed quite entertained with the notion of a Naughty Connect 4 for some reason!
• Our amateur dramatics, which were very amateur and dramatically poor. Our profound spiritual point of "God Wants Your Heart" might have been lost with the appearance of David in dressing gown, socks and sandals and carrying an inflatable sheep. Or Samuel and Jesse, David's father, having a swordfight with their walking sticks. Or David being anointed king with water tipped over his head.
• My visual illustration using the biggest Mint Aero bar in the world. I said the following: "the more you care about someone, the more chocolate you give them. Its the same with our hearts." The children were thinking: "How can I get some of that chocolate without playing Naughty Connect 4?"
• In the group work, one little six year old praying to Jesus to ask Him to help her give her heart to Him, so she can help her mummy lay the table at dinner time. Awwwwww!!!!

At the end, the children left to go to the front of the morning service because my predecessor was rightly being thanked for honoured for all her hard work. It was somewhat entertaining to see tons of children clutching colouring sheets and sucking furiously on lollies whilst sitting on a stage. Our lead elder was praying that this new generation would be like Samuel's in their lifetime. The thing is, I had dressed up as Samuel in the sketch, wearing a long cloak with a sombrero hat and a jester hat on top of that! I wonder what was going on in their minds....

Currently listening to: N-Trance - Set You Free from Electronic Pleasure