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Circle time
5 minutes
As you begin the session, invite the children to sit together in a circle and pass round a simple object. When a child has the object, they can share a story from their week. Sometimes it’s helpful to have a sand timer so that you have a set amount of time for each person to share if they want to. If a child doesn’t want to say anything they can just pass on the object. Pray and thank God for all the stories shared and the stories that weren’t mentioned.
Pour carefully
5 minutes
You will need: plastic cups; jug of water
Staying seated in the circle, give each child a plastic cup. Put a couple of centimetres of water into one of their cups. Ask them to very carefully pour the water into the next person’s cup and so on so that the water travels round the circle. Keep impressing on them how important the water is and how careful they should be.
Explain that in today’s story, water was very scarce because God had stopped the rain until the people started to listen to him again.
Bible story
10 minutes
You will need: a leader to be the boy; an appropriate costume; pitta bread; props such as a jug of oil and a tub of flour (optional)
Tell the children that God’s people had stopped following him and a wicked king called Ahab was in charge. God wanted the people to be his friends once more. So he sent a man called Elijah, who was a prophet. A prophet is someone who gives messages to people from God. Elijah told them that it wouldn’t rain until they started following God again. Why is it a problem if it doesn’t rain for a long time? Nothing grows and people get hungry! Say that you have someone here who was there at the time to tell a bit of the story. Either have someone else to do the story or put on a costume at this point to change your character. It hasn’t rained in so long! You might not think that’s a bad thing, but it’s a really big problem. When’s there’s no water, nothing grows. If nothing grows then there’s nothing to eat. My mum’s really worried: I’m all she’s got since my dad died and she feels she can’t look after me properly. Mind you, God does seem to be doing a good job of taking care of us so perhaps there’s no need to worry.
Mum met this weird guy at the gates of the city when she was collecting sticks for the fire. It was a sad day - we had hardly any more food and I think she thought it’d be the last dinner we’d ever get. This guy asked her for some bread. Mum didn’t have any! She said she’d help him if she could, but all she had was enough flour and oil to make bread for her and me. He told her not to worry. He told her to make him some bread. He told her that God would make sure that our flour and oil didn’t run out until the rains came.
She made him some bread and do you know what? He was right! Our flour and oil haven’t run out yet, it’s amazing! He quite often comes for tea that guy. His name’s Elijah.
But the story doesn’t finish there: I got sick last week, really sick. I don’t really remember much but my mum said I actually died… And this Elijah guy, he came up to see me and shouted out to God and I started breathing again. Just like that. And here I am!
Chatting together
5 minutes
Ask the children these questions, encouraging everyone to take turns to contribute: • What happened that was surprising in this story? • What happened in the story that made you happy? • What would have happened if the boy’s mum hadn’t shared what she had? • Do we find it easy to share? • What does today’s story tell you about God?
Creative response
10 minutes
You will need: half a cup of flour, one tablespoon of olive oil and a quarter cup of water for each child; plastic bags; cover-up and clean-up equipment
Say that you are going to make the sort of bread that the boy’s mum in the story was making. Help the children to mix their ingredients together and then knead their dough for a few minutes. As the children are kneading the bread, get them to carry on talking about the story and remembering what happened. Shape the dough like a cookie and bake at 180°C for 20 minutes (or send them home with their dough and baking instructions).
Prayer
5 minutes
As the bread is baking (or as they are kneading it), ask them to be quiet and think about how God provides what they need. They can say short thank you prayers out loud for those things as they think of them.
