Watching God at work

I am so excited. Today has been such a good day, and I am so thankful to the Lord for it. It has been fun being inside watching it snow outside. It has been a productive day. One of my tasks for today was to study for my lesson for Children's Church tomorrow. I must confess that it has been a little exhausting lately. I work with the children on Wednesday nights, and am supposed to teach the first Sunday of the month, but because last Sunday was the fifth Sunday, it was my week to cover, and then of course I have this Sunday. I enjoy teaching and working with the children, but I have been missing the fellowship with adults.

Yesterday in Personal Evangelism and Discipleship, we watched a movie by Ray Vander Laan talked about what a disciple is. I was really impacted by this movie that I am not living the life of a true disciple. A disciple would ask to follow a Rabbi. If the Rabbi allowed, this young man would watch everything he did, and mimic it. Take for instance in the Bible: when Jesus went off to pray, his disciples went to follow him. The disciples spent all of their time with the Lord. Why do I find it so hard to give God just a small portion of my day? Towards the end of the movie, Ray Vandar Laan asked, "How badly do you want to be like Jesus?"

What would you know, tomorrow's lesson for children's church comes from Matthew 4:18-22; 10:2-4. I think God is trying to say something to me. These passages have to do with Jesus choosing his disciples.

At the beginning, I was kind of bummed to be put with the 4s and 5s because they don't understand things as deeply as say, a fourth grader. God is definitely softening my heart though, and I feel this experience is helping me grow more then if I were working with older kids. I am having to stretch myself and become creative on how I will present the lesson to the kids so that they can understand the truth of the Bible, and then be able to apply it throughout the week. I am having fun (most of the time) trying to find activities to get the point across. One of my goals is that every activity we do throughout that time, that it relates to the story. Sometimes it is a bit challenging to find a craft that has to do with the story. Some of my challenges have been a craft to do with offering (Mark 12: 41-44), and the story of Lydia (Acts 16:11-15). I didn't particularly like the book's craft idea for tomorrow because it was just something like decorating one of the disciple's names. So I got to thinking and decided to make my own coloring sheet. It was a lot of fun thinking up, and watching as the thoughts evolved into a more in depth craft. Here they count the fish and count that there are twelve, their memory verse is on there, and they can remember how God said, "I will make you fishers of men". I am pleased with the end result and can't wait to share this excitement with the children in the morning. To God be the glory, great things He hath done!