Prayer is powerful, and each community needs to have someone praying for the young people in their church.
It is important to differentiate between prayer for the young peoples ministry, and prayer for the specific young people. I have found that often the former is much more widely prayed for than the latter. This little card is an easy way to ask specific adults to pray. In the example I have not put the child’s full name, it is designed to be filled as much as is needed and nothing more, the child’s name could be just a letter. Print the cards any size you wish, the back of the cards is a summery of the 8 steps if you wish to print it.
Those who receive a card are asked to use it to pray for a child for just one week, using the following 8 points as a guide. At the end of the week, if appropriate, the child can be informed that somebody from church was praying for them this week. The graphic to one side can be printed and placed on the noticeboard – for the prayer cards and the graphic please click on the images and a larger quality image will load.
 Start your prayer time by putting aside your issues, both those from today and from your own childhood. Ask God to help you pray unbiased for this child and their needs. Thank God for bringing this child’s needs to you.
 Be specific about the child you are praying for. Bring the child to mind if you know them, or use whatever information the card gives. Lift this individual to God as his child and his servant in his kingdom.
 Be age specific. Is this an exam year, is there anything in the local news that may effect them, etc. Below is a simple 4 word description of areas that may generate issues by age group, this is very general but may be useful as a starting place for some.
0-1 years
Feeding, Sleeping, Movement, Communication
1-2 years
Independence, Language, Instructions, Self Awareness
2-3 years
Cooperation, Separation anxiety, Defiance, Inter-dependence
3-5 years
Friendships, Exploration, Personality, Pre School
6-8 years
School, Acceptance, Awareness of future, Independent goals
9-11 years
Relationships, Responsibility, Puberty, Peer pressure
12-14 years
Body image, Academic results, Stress, Complex thought
 Siblings deeply shape a child’s everyday life. Consider praying for issues surrounding fairness and sibling rivalry, the process of sharing, and the strength to support each other. For single children pray for issues surrounding friendships, autonomy, and demanding attention.
 Pray for the parents. Pray for their lead in discovering God, their relationships, and their ability to provide for their children. Consider that for a child provision of love is arguably the most important.
 Pray for their contact with church. the group they are part of – it’s group dynamic and the leaders who serve. Pray for the groups needs and how they may influence the child.
 Pray for their strengths and passions Praise God for their gifting and ask him to open opportunities to use that gifting in the child’s life. Pray that they can receive the encouragement and necessary tools to develop their gifting.
 Pray for the child’s weaknesses and struggles. Pray that God will be with them in the dark moments they may encounter. Pray for strength, reassurance and confidence to face what may be troubling them and peace for the end of their journey through the present trials they face.
 
Quick notes:
Most bible passages and stories depict very ordinary people experiencing a very extraordinary God, but this one is quite the opposite. A secret king in waiting, living a very ordinary life, is spotted as a good musician and brought before the king to sooth his woes.
Saul is taken with David, he wants him to remain nearby and bestows on him the honour of carrying his armour.
David is anointed but not as king, rather as a chosen one, the elect of God. His anointing was not meant as a threat to Saul and his kingship would not begin for at least another decade.
David remains so unmemorable to the king that when faced with Goliath in the next chapter the king does not even remember his name.
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Names you need to know
Samuel – the great judge and prophet (pretty quiet around now)
David – means beloved, youngest son of 8, anointed king, spirit filled
Jesse – David’s dad (we don’t know who mum was)
Saul – The present king, who’d messed up so God had left him
Armor-bearer – This is a title such as lord or knight, it was literally the one who carried the kings armour and was a great honour, though not an exclusive one.
Historical significance
King Saul is being afflicted by an evil spirit send by God. Samuel had left him, God had left him and the thought must have crossed him mind that his kingship may be taken from him too. Meanwhile the region is not actively at war but is far from stable, it’s pretty safe to assume his ‘court’ would have been rather unsettled right now. The calming power of music, an idea by what must have been a desperate attendant, is grasped upon swiftly and a hunt ensues.
 Enter David, a youngster not fully grown. Saul, who is supposed to be quite imposing, would tower over him. Filled with Gods spirit by a rush of wind at his anointing by Samuel, David is not only godly, but handsome, strong and brave, plus a good speaker – all kingly qualities, but also ones that make him memorable by the kings servants. Samuel had gone to Bethlehem with the rouse of sacrificing a cow, anointing David in the presence of his brothers. Apart from a few prominent townspeople, David’s destiny was not common knowledge. It’s clear Saul had no idea who it was he was inviting into his presence, because it’s pretty safe to assume Saul would have killed him.
Instead David is given a small glimpse at what is to come. A chance to witness how a king lives, rules, and is treated by his subjects. He’s here to work, his kingly qualities qualifying him as a perfect kings servant. For to him the notion of his kingship is merely a promise, not a title to be taken. Soon he’s sending letters home to Jesse, signed with the kings seal. David’s given an intimate position of Armour bearer, one that shows great trust and honour. Yet the irony can’t be lost, the most direct preparation for his kingship comes through the lowliest of reasons – while being the youngest and least important son sent to guard the sheep, he had taken his harp or lyre to pass the hours. David who sings to his lambs and serenades the hillsides is now playing those same tunes for the most powerful man in his world.
Then the passage ends, leaving us thinking that Saul had come to love David, to give him a permanent position… but that’s not the case. The next chapter starts and David is back to being a shepherd and when David fights the Goliath Saul is unsure of his identity. It’s a point of contention, some claim David would have been brought into a darkened tent with a confused king, too deluded to really comprehend the musician, others argue the early stories of David are by no means in chronological order. More simple arguments wonder if David had aged and would look different from a distance, perhaps Saul had grown tired of David’s songs of a God who had abandoned the king, perhaps the evil spirit had calmed and David was called upon less frequently of late. Whatever the reason Saul and David are not so close as chapter 16 alone may lead one to believe.
If you want to put David’s like in context there is a great info-graphic by the good book company. (Pictured in small here)
Teaching is challenge, and often just when you think you are getting somewhere one of the beautiful little darlings turns around and lands a big philosophical question like a slap across the face. Your mind whirls and whizzes trying to find an answer you can fit into a sentence or two as you watch the crowd of faces light up with recognition of a major flaw in your teaching or even worse switch off completely. Working on your feet you feel like you have 3 options:
1. Try and say something to placate the child, hoping them don’t ask for details.
2. Tell the child that’s a big question and you’ll like a minute to think about the answer, then either revisit it or more likely forget.
3. Distract the children with a new activity.
There are specific courses run for explaining apologetics to kids, the web is full of one sentence answers, and yet I find them hugely dangerous. Many teens dismiss easy answers when faith stops producing them, they relegate God to Santa and the tooth fairy and other things that have just as daft reasoning behind them.
Take for example the age old question ‘why did God create the world’. Some say ‘he wanted the company’ more scripturally based answers are ‘for his glory’ (psalm 19) ‘because he loved us’ (Jeremiah 31) ‘because we were part of his plan’ (Ephesians 6) or ‘to do his work’ (Ephesians 2). None of them are really sufficient, the logic is incomplete at best. If I was really pressed for scripture I’d go with Isaiah:
“Do you not know? Have you not heard? The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary, and His understanding no one can fathom” (Isaiah 40:28).
It’s tough not knowing the answers and it’s tough admitting it. It makes us sound weak, foolish and uneducated, but pat answers are just as bad. We are blessed to be in relationship with a God too big for answers but willing to make himself small enough for us to ask. We should not be afraid of the words ‘I don’t know‘, because you can always follow them with ‘God is a mystery, faith is believing even when you can’t find the answers, because you know enough answers to not need to know them all.’ Teaching youngsters to see God as the greatest of mysteries to discover, is a gift we have been given and one we should not squander with pat answers.
Quick notes:
God has been quiet for 40 years. his people have turned away from him and to their eyes he has abandoned them
The israelites are occupied people, terrorised and controlled by the philistines that surround them
The main problem they face is the problem of the underdog, they are weak and can’t amass armies while being occupied.
However, this is not a totally volatile time, Samsons choice of a wife from the Philistines is frowned upon but accepted on both sides.
Samson’s story is a mirror to the story of Jesus in many ways, but Samson was the warrior the Jews expected not the humble saviour they received.
Samson was in many ways weak, and his actions are truly appalling, he is not a hero to imitate.
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Names you need to know
Manoah – Father, questioner, needs reassurance but wants to do right.
Manoah’s wife – name-less yet initial revelation
Samson – nazarite, headstrong, at times unwittingly manipulated by God
Delilah – name means worshipper, probably a high end prostitute.
Historical significance
Israel has fallen away from God, and in response God has gone quiet. Before there were Judges, people who literally held court and judged, judged the arguments, judged the ideas, judged the religion. While some were noteworthy the last few before Samson are pretty unremarkable, or at least the bible remarks very little about them.
During the time of silence the Israelites have been on the receiving end of neighbouring nations wishes. The Philistines have come and pillaged, subdued, and basically run amok. The parallels to the Roman empire at the time of Jesus are blazingly obvious.
There are often sections to a story and Samsons has 5.
1. The conception,
2. The riddle,
3. The consequences,
4. The betrayal and
5. The redemption.
While sections 2,4 and 5 lend themselves best to storytelling, section 1 is crucial. Without first examining the place and purpose of Samson’s life the falling of the temple looks like a desperate act made by a man who has nothing left to lose. The whole thing about the riddle and the burning foxes is, to some extent, Samson having a temper tantrum and is actually much harder to teach an applicable lesson around. What it does do is show the neighbouring nations that these Israelites are no longer a pushover and gives a platform for Samson to be a judge, which he does for 20 years before meeting Delilah.
Thoughts
The bible is a wonderful book, full of drama and battles, full of sorrow, struggles, and consequences for foolishness. It’s a real time tale of a struggling people and their developing relationship with a deity. At many times it’s downright bloody and never more so than when you take a single story out of the whole narrative.
The story of Samson has its fair share of rather grisly solutions. For some groups this is a selling point, a little bit of nasty wrapped up in a story where the good guys win, a familiar and often popular format.
If I could have changed one thing about my own church education as a child, it would have been to learn more acceptance and less judgement. In many Old Testament stories God’s people resort to violence, and while not all fights can be resolved with words, it’s not actions we want our kids to imitate. We need to mix that message with the acceptance of Jesus, the willingness to welcome all, the gentiles meeting the pureness of the Jews and sharing communion.
Our challenge with stories such as these is to get past the drama, gore, good guy verses bad guy and paint a wider picture. Ask “Why did God allow this to happen?”, we know God can do these things, his power is boundless, but the real crux is the why. Samson’s life was a message to the Philistines, a message that God is powerful and will protect his people, even if Samson was less of a polite letter and more a sledgehammer through the front door.
 There is a beautiful disconnect between our aspirations and our reality. We aspire to greatness, to leave a legacy, to make a name for ourselves, and yet humility and service don’t come with glowing awards. Indeed the greatest of saints will probably be people we have never heard the slightest utterance of their deeds, nor whispers of their names.
The lesson of James “the minor”, “the little”, “the lesser”, or “the younger” is probably the most vivid example of this. There must have been a great reason for Jesus to chose this man over the others who accompanied their party, but the reason remains obscured. Little James, perhaps younger, perhaps shorter, was by no means truly ‘lesser’ because his story is untold, it may actually be the case that his contribution was greater, we will never know.
We know so little. There was a James, that was not John’s brother, amongst the 12, all Gospel accounts clearly agree on this. Plus, there were others Jesus could have chosen, for Jesus chose, inferring a larger party. This is confirmed when Judas has exited himself from the picture and the disciples chose a replacement for him. We know that James “the great”, brother to John, was a more compelling figure in the group, indeed that James is part of Jesus’ inner circle… but this James, apart from his name and possibly his fathers, we hear no word.
So why should we take a session of our precious time to study a man who is rather unknown?
Firstly there are 12 disciples, they all deserve our attention. Secondly, if you examine the people you have met in your journeys who have shown Christ to you, will probably find more obscure than famous characters. Thirdly, blank spaces fascinate people, especially children, it lets their imagine come to the foreground.
Do join me in the coming weeks building a session to look at the possibilities, examine the reasons for Jesus choosing 12, imagine the purpose of choosing this James – what did he bring to the table, you never know, perhaps that was his speciality and he was the groups chef?
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Shortly after Christmas my husband shouted to me from the bedroom that there was a nun in the house. What he had seen was a partial pillow reflected in a mirror. Meanwhile what his brain had so readily done was try to assign the shape meaning and hit on a face. As a race we see faces everywhere, it’s even got a name : pareidolia. If you’ve ever thought a car was looking angry or a socket looked like it was screaming (
If you ask a child to draw a person the head will often be dis-proportionally large, because the face is the important part they want to show. This is well studied, having clearly defined eyes and high contrast faces is a technique used deliberately in 
The infants stick is now a wand, a pen, a drumstick! While they continue to learn about their world through their senses they can learn about worlds closed to them by practicing the art of imitation. They unlock the dressing up cupboard and suddenly little Susie is Elsa and Dan is Spiderman. This is an important step in the development of empathy, role play allows us to imagine other peoples feelings in a way children’s brains are not hard wired for. Yet when Elsa runs away the child knows exactly what to do because they know these characters narratives already. As they repeat the characters actions the link with them becomes stronger and the more the narrative settles in them. Pause and just that last sentence with bible characters in mind.
The latest lesson onsite is a good example of this. Jesus teaches about the lamp being hidden under a bed or basket, a bushel. It’s a simple idea, it lends itself well to science experiments and games in dimmed light but I’ve chosen to give it a face. 
