VBS Day 4

   In many VBS (vacation Bible school) sequences day 4 is the day when the gospel is presented. At College Church of the Nazarene (Nampa, ID) this year we used Roar: Life is Wild-God is Good by Group. I was the elementary storyteller. It had a nice set of interactive lessons around the Exodus story but day four seemed too far out of the basic Exodus story line. So, I re-wrote it. My basic change was to focus on Jesus as the Passover Lamb enabling the people of God to give up their sins in order to live in ways that represented God. The curriculum focused on Jesus as a sacrifice for guilt. Here is a rough transcript of my day 4 Bible story. There is a little paraphrasing here from Tom Wright's book The Day the Revolution Began as well as from my work on John Wesley's definition of the gospel.

   On Tuesday we were sitting together in our homes waiting to leave Egypt and to be free from slavery. We had done what God told us to do. We had sacrificed a perfect lamb, spread the blood over the door posts, and made a meal—all the time ready to leave. The angel of death passed over our families.

   Even in our day, the people of God still remember and celebrate the Passover (like a holiday or a festival each year). But we are going to time travel back just about 2000 years. Then Israelites then also celebrated the Passover meal. They remembered when God had broken Pharaoh’s power and freed his people from slavery. They talked about all the details that we have walked through these past three days: the unfair slavery, the scary Egyptian slave masters and Moses going before Pharaoh ten times, the plagues, the protection of the Israelite families from the angel of death, crossing the Red Sea, the journey in the wilderness and God’s providing water, manna, and quail for them…

   It can also be a time to remember the grumbling, the complaining, and even the asking to go back to Egypt (let the kids rehearse these). It can be a time to remember that they didn’t always trust God’s rescue plan for them. It can be a time for remembering that they didn’t always trust God’s instructions for their lives…basically, times when they did not believe that God is good. It is especially hard to trust when life is unfair, scary, and changing.

   But celebrating Passover is not just about remembering that one event when God brought freedom. It is also about looking ahead to see how God will bring freedom again and again.

   What or who have we been learning about this week?   We have learned that “When life is unfair—God is good!” “ When life is scary—God is good!” “When life changes…God is good!” And today,  “When life is sad—God is good!” What or who have we been learning about this week? (Allow and affirm answers bringing the conversation fairly quickly to the answer “God”.)

   God has been the main actor in the story and that is important for us to remember. We often focus on our role in the story but when we look at God as the main actor there is so much more that is possible.

   We have also learned about the people of Israel (who we read about in the Bible) who are called “the People of God.” (Point out your Bible and maybe that it can be read as a book or on your phone.) What might it mean to be called “the People of God?” (Affirm answers. We’ll get to a meaning soon.)

   God is good and God is good to all people. Life can be unfair, and scary, and change, and be sad. Life can have many bad things happen in it. But, God is doing something in this world. God’s rescue plan is for the whole world but God chose the people of Israel to be his special people—to play a special part in his rescue plan for the whole world. That is why they are called “the People of God.”

   As the people of God they were supposed to live the way God told them to live and they were supposed to show the world what God is like. They were supposed to be his representatives in the unfair, scary, changing, and often sad world. Their story is supposed to be about God even more than it is about themselves.

   But God also has this job in mind for all people. (Raise your hand if you are a people—a human being.) A big part of Israel’s job as the people of God was to let all the other peoples know that God wants us to be his representatives in a world that is unfair, scary, and changes, and that can be sad. God made all of us to show his goodness to others—especially when life is like that. (Is there anything unfair or scary at school or at home or with our friends? Name calling, stealing, and not sharing are good examples. When these things happen we could call names too. We could say, “if you don’t share with me I won’t share with you. Or, we could just pretend that we don’t see these bad things happening to others and ignore it or hide. But, what would God’s representative do?)

   (Have a backpack full of rocks ready and a few rocks to put into it as you explain.)

   Being God’s representative is an amazing thing—isn’t it! God made us to do all sorts of amazing things. Jumping is a sort of amazing thing. Everyone show me your highest  jump. (chose one child who can jump high. Let all the kids see how high he or she can jump.)

   Let’s compare jumping to being a good representative of God. What happens when we don’t trust God (put in a rock), when we don’t live the way God wants us to live (put in a rock), when we complain or even ask to go back to slavery (put in two rocks)…

   Well. Try jumping with these on your back. (Let your representative kids try to pick up the backpack and jump. Mine was so heavy that they could not even lift it onto their backs but they could try.) (All the kids will, of course, believe that they could personally do it if you gave them the chance but time will not allow and you will have to move on.)

   It might be fun to try to jump with all these rocks on your back for a little while but if you really wanted to jump you wouldn’t want all these rocks—you would start to hate these rocks.

   Take a seat and listen very closely.

   I told you that we were going back 2000 years (to the time of Jesus)…and the people of Israel then celebrated to Passover every year and they remembered. 2000 years ago—where we have traveled to today—an Israelite man sat down with his friends to a Passover meal. He was a very special Israelite man and his name is Jesus. They had prepared the lamb and all the other parts of the meal—the bread and the juice/wine.

   Then Jesus did something very different. He gave his disciples the Passover food and said, “This is my body broken for you.” He gave them the Passover juice/wine and said, “This is my blood poured out for you.” “As often as you eat and drink this Passover meal remember me.”

   They were supposed to remember when they had this meal. They were supposed to remember the slavery that God had rescued them from, Moses going before Pharaoh, the plagues, the perfect lamb, the angel of death, leaving in a hurry, the Red Sea, God’s care in the wilderness… they were supposed to remember but Jesus said that they were supposed to remember him with that meal.

   Jesus had chosen the Passover meal (very intentionally) to tell his friends and us something about himself and about God. There are a lot of things that what Jesus said might mean but one thing that it definitely means is that Jesus is telling them that he is like the Passover Lamb. Jesus is saying that he is the sacrifice that said, “these are the people of God—angel of death pass over them.” Jesus was saying that he himself was the way that God would bring freedom from slavery. Jesus was saying that he himself was how God would show his goodness in a world that is unfair, scary, changing, and sad.

   After that, Jesus was arrested by the Romans because many of the people of Israel were afraid of him. They were afraid of what God was doing through him. The Romans took Jesus and nailed him to a cross like this one (direct their attention to the cross) and they let him hang there. Then they stuck a spear in his side and Jesus died. They put his body in a tomb/a grave.

      (allow a moment of silence)

   When Jesus told his friends that he would be the Passover sacrifice there was a lot of sadness. When the people of Israel wanted Jesus dead there was a lot of sadness. When Jesus died there was a lot of sadness...but when life is sad—God is good.

   Three days later something amazing happened. Jesus came back to life.

   That could mean a lot of things but it is like Jesus said, “the people of God will have life and will live with God’s goodness and will show the world how good God is!”

   In a letter written by one of Jesus followers (1 Cor. 15:1-4 CEB) the writer says “I want to call your attention to the good news that I preached to you, which you also received and in which you stand. You are being saved through it if you hold on to the message I preached to you, unless somehow you believed it for nothing. I passed on to you as most important what I also received: Christ died for our sins in line with the scriptures, he was buried, and he rose on the third day in line with the scriptures.”

So Jesus friends, the people who follow Jesus, remember this as the good news.

   Jesus, part of the people of Israel, had a very special part in God’s rescue plan for the world. In fact, we can say that Jesus is God’s rescue plan. Jesus invites us to be a part of the people of God and to show the world the goodness of God—to show the world what God is like.

   Like the people of Israel we sometimes do things, and think things, and say things, and even want things that keep us from showing God’s goodness-like rocks keep us from jumping. We call those things “sins”—the things we do, or think, or say, or want that keep us from living well as the people of God. Jesus died for our sins. We learn that we can give our sins up and as followers of Jesus we can live that amazing life of showing what God is like. When life is unfair, and scary, and changing, and sad…we can show that God is good. Our sins hold us back but we can hand them over to Jesus and follow him.

   Take a rock out of the backpack (or hand them one—it speeds things up because they will want to choose the biggest one) and put it at the foot of the cross. Think about those things that keep you from showing the world what God is like while you give that rock to Jesus.

If time:

(1) What sins keep us from the amazing life of showing God’s goodness to others?

(2) How can our lives with Jesus be like freedom from slavery?