THIS WEEK’S PASSAGE
Judges 15:3-20
BACKGROUND PREPARATION Before the session you will need to prepare two one kilogram bags. You could use bought bags of rice but homemade bags of sand or soil could also be used. For the ‘Timeless gifts’ activity you need to print pictures of five top Christmas gifts from last year and cut them into pieces to make jigsaws. You will also need pieces of A4 paper and a pen (preferably all the same colour) for each young person and a stopwatch.
Test your strength
10 mins
As you begin the session, ask for three volunteers who think they are strong enough to hold two one kilogram bags. Invite them up one at a time and get them to stand holding the bags at the top so the weight hangs down. Each volunteer must then lift the bags so their arms are completely outstretched and level and hold them there for as long as possible. Start timing as soon as their arms are horizontal and stop timing as soon as their arms start to dip. It is advisable to have two volunteers waiting to take the bags when the arms start to lower.
Timeless gifts
5 mins
Split the young people into five groups (or whatever number works for your group) and hand out one jigsaw of a popular Christmas gift for each group. Ask the young people to construct them. When they’re done ask the young people how it feels to receive a gift. Invite the young people to discuss positive experiences of gifts that they have received. Why did they like the gift so much? What could they do with it? Why was it important to them?
Read the passage
10 mins
Provide your young people with Bibles and ask them to look up Judges 15:3-20 before reading the passage together. Ask your young people:
• What do you notice about Samson?
• What did God do in verse 14?
• Who did Samson say had accomplished the victory in verse 18?
Gifts from God
15 mins
Put the young people back into their five groups and give each group one of the passages below to look up in their Bibles. Ask them to draw out the spiritual gifts from each and list them. (If you have less than five groups you could give some groups more than one passage.)
• Romans 12:6-8 (Leadership, teaching, prophecy, encouragement, service, mercy, giving)
• 1 Corinthians 12:8-10 (Discernment, prophecy, faith, healing, miracles)
• 1 Corinthians 12:28-30 (Administration, teaching, knowledge, wisdom, apostleship, service)
• Ephesians 4:11 (Teaching, pastoring, evangelism, apostleship)
• 1 Peter 4:9-11 (Hospitality)
Ask the young people to feedback and build a bigger list to incorporate them all. Then ask someone to read 1 Corinthians 12:7 to the rest of the group.
Gift tags
15 mins
Give each young person a piece of paper and a pen and ask them to write their name in the middle of it. Explain to your young people that they are to pass their piece of paper to the person on their left. Once they receive the new piece of paper encourage them to write an anonymous positive statement about the person who is named in the middle of it. It could be a gift that they have identified from the list in ‘Gifts from God’ or an encouraging message about who they are. Continue passing the pieces of paper around and writing on them until each young person ends up with their own piece again. Once everyone has had a chance to read through their statements explain to the group that they have exercised a gift of encouragement.
Close
5 mins
Bring the session to a close by asking the young people about the spiritual gifts mentioned in ‘Gifts from God’ and ask if they would like any of them. Spend some time praying together and ask the Holy Spirit for his gifts. Remind the young people that God gave a gift to Samson to help him in his leadership task that he had and that God gives gifts to us to help us build the church. We all have a role within the Church and spiritual gifts help us with this. The young people can take their paper from the ‘Gift tag’ activity as an encouraging reminder of the session.
For notes for adapting see the links sections of the Youthwork website.
KEY POINT #1
Emphasise that God blessed Samson with a special gift of strength which was given to him when the Spirit came on him. The God-given gift of strength helped him in his leadership to overcome the Philistines.
KEY POINT #2
Help your young people see that the Holy Spirit helped Samson by giving him a gift of strength. The Holy Spirit also gives gifts today that help not only leaders but everyone. God gives us gifts to help build up the Church and we should eagerly desire them. Ask if anyone has any experience of these gifts they would like to share.
