Spring Term 2

In the collective worship box each week

Cloth with the colour of the Church year ( this week is green)

• Bible
• Cross
• Candle

For this week

A crown, a book ( to represent wisdom) 

Making links

This connects with the concept of the People of God and panel 3 of the Understanding Christianity frieze you could include the people of God concept symbol in your box.  

Digging deeper and learning more

The Kingdom of David marked a high point in the history of Israel, his son Solomon inherited a peaceful land taking full advantage of this. Towards the start of his reign God appeared to Solomon, offering to grant any request, the king’s choice was wisdom; the ability to exercise sound judgement and rule the nation justly. This request was granted and part of his heritage was the compilation of wise saying found in the Bible book of Proverbs. During this time of peace the nation grew richer, as God had promised, alliances were made with the larger regional powers while many rulers were curious to meet his monarch renowned for his wisdom and riches. King David had always wanted to build a permanent worship centre and had even purchased the land but it was his son who was able to build the Temple church in Jerusalem. By modern standards the building was quite modest less than thirty metres long and nine metres wide, but it was the centre of worship for the Israelite nation.

He who restrains his lips is wise. – Proverbs 10:19

Give freely and become more wealthy; be stingy and lose everything. The generous will prosper; those who refresh others will themselves be refreshed.  Proverbs 11: 24-25

The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but a wise man is he who listens to counsel. Proverbs 12:15

Pride leads to conflict; those who take advice are wise. – Proverbs 13:10 

Better to eat vegetables with people you love than to eat the finest meat where there is hate. Proverbs 15:17

Plans fail for lack of counsel,     but with many advisors they succeed. Proverbs 15:22

Listen well to wise counsel and be willing to learn from correction so that by the end of your life you’ll be known for your wisdom. – Proverbs 19:20

A good name is to be more desired than great wealth, favour is better than silver and gold. Proverbs 22:1

Set up your worship table or centre of the class circle with the normal time (green) cloth and take out the Bible, cross and light candle.  

Opening responses

If you have school responses or opening words for collective worship say them together or say the following:

We take out the Bible 
And think about God the Father
We take out the cross 
And think about God’s son, Jesus
We light the candle
And think about God , the Holy Spirit

Big question – looking at the clues in the box, I wonder what our story might be about today?  

If you are using this for class worship – take out the items in the box (see notes for the teacher) and place them in the centre

Can anyone remember what our story last week was all about? 

Make connections last week we learnt about David and how he was chosen by God to be King.  David was the second King of Israel (remember last week’s story and king Saul who was the first King?) 

Today we are going to move forward another few chapters in God’s big story to the book of 1 Kings.   David has died and his son Solomon is now King.  The first 11 chapters of 1 Kings tell us all about Solomon.   He was known for his wisdom (many of the wise sayings in the book of Proverbs are credited to Solomon) and his wealth.  Today’s story is all about the wisdom of King Solomon.

Read 1 Kings 3:4-15

The Lion Storyteller Bible – The Wise King

You can use the items in the box to help tell the story

A brief overview for the teacher 

It was David’s great ambition to build God’s Temple in Jerusalem, but that task fell to his son, Solomon, who inherited a successful and peaceful kingdom. He formed alliances with many kingdoms and created a walled capital city. Like his father he respected and honoured God. While observing a religious festival the voice of God spoke directly to him in a dream. Solomon was offered whatever gift he desired. He chose wisdom, the ability to tell wrong from right so that he could be a good ruler. God granted that wish and was so pleased with such a simple request that Solomon was also given the things that he did not ask for, riches and honour. Up to that time worship had taken place in a special tented enclosure but eventually a magnificent Temple to God was opened for worship.

Wondering questions 

I wonder what part of the story you liked best?
I wonder what part of the story was the most important?
I wonder what you think the word wisdom means?
I wonder why Solomon asked God to give him wisdom?
I wonder what helps you make wise choices?
I wonder who you think is a wise person and why?

Reflection activity :

Take a look at some examples of wise sayings known as proverbs from the book of proverbs here.  Encourage pupils to take one and spend a minute reflecting about what it might mean.  Encourage pupils to talk in pairs or small groups about what they could learn from this proverb and how they could apply it to themselves and in school.

Proverbs Download

.docx / 61 KB

Prayer

Dear God

Thank you for the story of Solomon. Help us to listen to each other and to be wise in our actions and word.  Amen

In the collective worship box each week

Cloth with the colour of the Church year ( this week is purple)

• Bible
• Cross
• Candle

Purple is the colour used in church during Lent (26^th Feb – 10^th April 2020), It will change to gold and white at Eastertide (11th April to 30^th May 2020). In some churches, all the colours and hangings are taken down on Maundy Thursday so there is ‘no colour’ on Good Friday and Holy Saturday.

For this week –  lemon, sugar, oil, ashes, palm cross

Making links

This connects with the concept of the Gospel and panel 5 of the Understanding Christianity frieze you could include the Gospel concept symbol in your box.  

Further resources

You could explore the temptations of    Jesus through the following resources:

Si Smith Video 40:RE:Start  Jesus Baptism and Temptation

Digging deeper and learning more

The season of Lent in the church is the forty days beginning with Ash Wednesday and ending on Holy Saturday. For Christians it is a time of preparation, reflection and repentance leading up to the celebrations of Easter. Many Christians focus on their relationship with God, often choosing to give something up or to  volunteer and give of themselves for others.

Lent is 40 days long as it reflects the 40 days Jesus spent fasting in the wilderness before he began his public ministry.  I know what you are thinking…..there are 46 days between Ash Wednesday and  HolySaturday!  Sundays are feast days in the church and so during Lent, Sundays are counted as ‘little Easters’ so the 6 Sundays in Lent are excluded from the 40 days.  

Ash Wednesday is the beginning of Lent.  It is given its name because of the traditional blessing of the ashes taken after the burning of Palm crosses from the previous year’s Palm Sunday celebrations. In Anglican churches, the ashes are used to draw a cross on the head of people to mark the beginning of their Lent fast.

Set up your worship table or centre of the class circle with the Lent(purple) cloth and take out the Bible, cross and light candle.  

Opening responses

If you have school responses or opening words for collective worship say them together or say the following:

We take out the Bible 
And think about God the Father
We take out the cross 
And think about God’s son, Jesus
We light the candle
And think about God , the Holy Spirit

Explain that today we are thinking about a special day in the church year Ash Wednesday.  The beginning of Lent (see Digging Deeper)

Read The story of the temptations of Jesus You can read this in Matthew 4: 1-11, Mark 1: 9-13 and Luke 4: 1-13.   

 What do these three things have in common? A lemon, a bag of sugar, oil and some ashes Invite responses as appropriate and agree that they are linked with the start of the weeks before Easter that Christians call Lent

Sorry scenarios

Ask pupils to indicate whether they would be sorry or not sorry for a range of instances taken from the list below or your own ideas. If you have the space you can locate ‘very sorry’ at one end of the room and ‘not sorry at all’ at the other end and ask pupils to move from one end of the room to the other to show their ‘sorry rating’. In smaller groups this might naturally lead to some discussion as people try to work out where on the line they might stand

·You were asked to move your bag out of the way, and you forgot, and someone has just tripped over it and hurt themselves

·Someone who has been mean to you has lost their phone

·Your Mum baked 10 cupcakes for her friends and you ate one whilst she wasn’t looking, and now one of her friends has to go without

·You threw your plastic bottle in to a hedge as you were walking past because you couldn’t be bothered to carry it home

·Someone got hit be a car on the zebra crossing down your road

·You repeated the unkind words that somebody else had said about somebody you know and they overhead you saying it

Sometimes we are tempted and we do things that we know are wrong like stealing cakes that don’t belong to us, sometimes things happen that make us sad, but we don’t need to say sorry for them because it was not our fault at all. Sometimes we forget to do what we are supposed to, and sometimes we are just lazy. Often the bad choices that we make have an impact on others, sometimes we get away with it, but that doesn’t mean that we made a good choice in the first place. Christians believe that The Bible talks about how all of these things can add up and get in the way of a friendship with God.

Christians like to remember this more specially and at the beginning of Lent, just after Shrove Tuesday or pancake day many churches hold an Ash Wednesday service. At this service Christians are asked to think about all the things that they might not have said sorry for, and are reminded of God’s forgiveness with a symbol that is painted on their forehead. Many centuries ago covering yourself in cold ashes from a fire was a demonstration that you were really sad and sorry that something had happened. Now the symbol of a cross made from ashes (often of the palm crosses from the year before) which is mixed with some oil, is made on the forehead of each participant in the service as a sign to remind them that they have said sorry and God has forgiven them

Wondering questions 

I wonder what part of the story you liked best?
I wonder what part of the story was the most important?
I wonder why churches often make the ashes from burning the palm crosses from the year before?
I wonder why the cross mark is put on the forehead?
I wonder what things I say sorry for that I don’t really mean?
I wonder what things I should say sorry for? ( this last question leads in to the reflection activity)

Reflection activity :
You can use one of the following activities from Prayer Spaces in Schools 

Sorry Strings
Magnadoodles
Fizzy forgiveness

Prayer

Dear God, please help us when we are tempted to do something we know is wrong.  Help us to try our best to do the right thing.

Amen