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Aim:
To think about who Jesus is, and how we can make a decision about who we think he is
Bible base:
LUKE 8:22–25
Equipment:
Large pictures of famous people (such as the Queen, a member of One Direction, a CBBC presenter, and a local footballer), paper, sticky tape, large cardboard boxes, long cardboard tube or broom handle.
Before the session, prepare your pictures of famous people. Stick paper flaps over parts of the photos so that they obscure the face, making
it difficult to tell who it is. You might need three or four flaps per picture. Alternatively, you could prepare and project a slide show with famous people’s faces pixelated. Make a ‘boat’ out of the large cardboard boxes, either by sticking boxes together or opening them out and joining the lengths of cardboard to form the sides of the boat. Make sure that children can easily climb in and out of it. Include a mast made out of a broom handle or long cardboard tube. You will also need to prepare and bring someone with you for ‘A leader’s story’.
Opening activity
Show the pictures of famous people with their faces obscured. For each one, ask if anyone can tell who it is. If no one can, lift the flaps one by one-by-one until someone guesses correctly. When all the faces have been revealed, ask the children how they were able to tell who it was. Maybe they recognised a hairstyle or saw a crown or another item that gave it away. In our day-to-day lives, how can we tell who people are? Seeing their face is the most obvious answer, but sometimes it’s the sound of their voice (on the phone for example), the things they do or the special names they call us.
Story telling
Explain that you’re going to tell the children a story from the Bible about Jesus. It’s a story that takes place in a boat on a big lake called
Lake Galilee. Show the children the boat. Create a space in the middle of where the children are sitting and push your boat into the middle
of it. Ask for volunteers to be Jesus and some disciples (you may only want four or five disciples, any more would be a bit chaotic!). Help your volunteers into the boat and ask them to act out the story as you tell it.
Tell the rest of the children that they are going to be the lake. Explain that there’s a storm in the story, and you need to practise making the sounds of rain and wind. Divide the children into sections and give each section a different noise to make. One section could clap their hands, another click their fingers, a third stamp their feet and a fourth make an ‘ooh’ sound with their voices. Act as a conductor and explain that when you want a section to make their noise, you’ll point at them. Show them actions for getting louder (raising a hand) or getting quieter (moving a hand down). Finally show them a sign that means you want them to stop suddenly. Have a go at creating the noise of a storm by asking one section to make their noise. Bring in other sections, asking them to get louder until you have a great storm blowing! Then stop them suddenly. This may get a bit chaotic so you could warn the staff beforehand that you’re going to do this – they might help you to keep order! If you like, the children could wave their hands too. Tell the story using the retelling below your own version, or reading Luke 8:22–25 from a child-friendly translation of the Bible.
One day, Jesus and his friends got into a boat to cross Lake Galilee. ‘Let’s go across the lake!’ he said. They got into the boat and off they went! It was quite peaceful and Jesus fell asleep. But soon, a strong wind started to blow. Rain started to fall and the waves got bigger and bigger. The disciples were scared – they thought they were going to be killed! But Jesus was still asleep!
The waves got bigger, the wind got stronger, the rain got heavier, but still Jesus slept on. The disciples went to Jesus and shook him awake. ‘Jesus!’ they shouted. ‘We’re all going to drown!’ Jesus got up calmly and told the storm to stop, and just like that, it did! ‘Where is your faith?’ he asked them. His friends were afraid and amazed. ‘Who is this man?’ they asked each other.
Jesus was very powerful to be able to stop a storm, but his friends still didn’t understand who he was.
A leader’s story
Ask another Christian to come up and tell you who they think Jesus is. How do they know who Jesus is? They should draw out that they know who he is by the things he says and the things he does. Ensure that they use language like ‘I believe…’ and ‘Christians believe…’
Response
After all the noise and chaos of the storm, ask the children to sit quietly for a moment. Ask them what they think about Jesus. They might not know enough about him yet, or they might know Jesus already. If appropriate, finish with a prayer thanking Jesus for his power. Ask him to help you all think a bit more about who Jesus is.
