RRRRING!
RRRRRRRRRRING! It was that dreaded 8:30 Sunday morning phone call that tells us we have something to adjust at church. "No, no, not this morning. Please, not me this morning I groaned to myself." Then Spencer was handing the phone to me. I knew my wishes were not going to be granted this morning.
"
Shoshannah, can you teach my Sunday school class? I wanted to say that I didn't feel very well that day either and just send the kids to someone
else's class, but I didn't. I wanted to say, I teach my kids all week, and teach Wednesday night. I NEED a BREAK from kids!" But I didn't. What kept going through my mind was what a preacher said in revival at our church last week. "When other people won't do things, don't complain. Praise the Lord that you get the blessing of serving Him."
As I got the materials for the class, I thought "How boring for 5-6 year
olds." "The First Church?" ....and the lesson was boring until about half way through. There was only one drab picture provided, the lesson didn't really have any
relevance to the kid's lives until I mentioned that 3,000 people got saved and were baptized. "Why were the people baptized?" I asked. Why does God want us to be baptized?
"To get saved?" was the questioning response. "No, the people were already saved, and baptism does not save you, but it is something that God wants us to do."
"So we can eat that little cracker and drink that little juice!" came another excited answer. I had to laugh at that answer. My little girl has been dying to take communion.
"I'm saved," said one in the normal random way of little children. "I'm saved,"said another. "I'm saved too," said a third. "Really?" I questioned the third. "No, I'm just joking,"said the third.
Of course this led back to the discussion of salvation that we had last week when I subbed in this class.
"Why do we need to be saved?"
"Because we sin."
"What is sin?"
"All the bad things we do."
"Do you do bad things?"
"No." Then a big grin came across the little boy's face. "I'm just joking."
I thought, "Well, at least I got one point across last week. Last week, he didn't think that he ever sinned."
As the conversation continued, he said that he wanted be with his mom when he asked Jesus to save him. I'm so glad that he has a sensitive heart.
Our conversation headed back to baptism. I explained that the first thing God tells us to do after we get saved is to get baptized. "Why would he want us to get baptized?"I asked. The kids had no clue, so I explained that baptism show the world that we have been saved and want to follow Jesus. I then showed them how that going down under the water shows Jesus dying and being buried, and coming up out of the water represents Jesus rising from the dead.
"Some people call sprinkling with water "baptism", but it doesn't mean anything. But we go under the water and come up again because of what it means," I told the class. I then showed them what the preacher does when he baptizes you. Each one of them thought that had to be demonstrated on. So the class ended up being fun instead of
irrelevant and boring as it had started out.
That night one of the saved children went forward for baptism, and I think the other one would have too except they fell asleep in church. :D I'm also thinking that the other little child will get saved soon.
...and to think I would have missed all that if I would not have subbed. That was my blessing for the day.
