Samuel on Sunday

I really enjoyed my Sunday School class this week. The lesson was question and answer: What is God? God is spirit and has not a body like man. (I'm not sure that's the exact English - I worked with it in Russian, of course.) The story was on God calling the boy Samuel in the night.

Because I have split these lessons into two parts, the first part is the question and answer with verse, and the second part the Bible story - well, I've done a lot of modifying. Usually I do the Q & A the first week, the story the second week, with review of Q&A. This week, for some reason, I forgot to do the Q&A first, but prepared the story of Samuel instead.

Now earlier in January we did the story of the Ark of the Covenant in Dagon's temple. So, I started the story this week with Hannah praying and took it all the way to the Ark in Dagon's temple. Kind of a "and now you know the rest of the story" format.

There was so much in the story that we didn't get to the craft, but that's ok. We'll do it next week.

Because Jamie was preaching and he needs a translator, and because it was communion Sunday, I left before communion started. Hmmm - maybe I need to back up a bit more here in explanation!

Church starts at 1:00 pm now because that is the only time we could rent this place (there is another tiny church meeting there in the mornings). Several kids from another class at the orphanage come in to the service after it has started - sometimes even after the sermon is half way through. This is the only time they can come because their lunch schedule interferes - but their teacher wants them to come. The church has adapted. It has been interesting to watch peoples' reactions and coming to accept it as normal. Of course, when our building is finished, we'll have a "regular" schedule and this won't happen.

There are 2 or 3 girls and a bunch of boys, all in the 10-12 year age range, up to 15 of them sometimes. The boys were all sitting together in a couple rows and started getting in trouble. One Sunday one of them brought a clicker or tiny cap gun and kept setting it off. Other times they talked and laughed.

So Vitaly, our ruling elder in training, about 68 or 69 years old, went over to the orphanage and had a talk with the boys with their caretakers present. Then the next Sunday he made an announcement to the congregation. The boys are supposed to spread out and sit with adults, not in groups by themselves. This has worked pretty well so far.

Sunday School is after the service. This first class goes home and another class comes in for Sunday School. Now, if the sermon goes long, which often happens when there is translation, the kids come in and I have to leave. We meet upstairs in a different room so it works out well, except I don't hear the end of the sermon.

Sunday Mel was home sick with some sort of bug that gave him a headache and stomach ache. During the pastoral prayer the older kids came in. I realized someone was standing next to me, so I opened my eyes and looked up. The boy there smiled at me and reached down and kissed me on the cheek! I was very surprised, to say the least. I patted the seat on the other side of my purse, Bible and coat and he sat down. About 5 minutes into the sermon he turned around and started messing with the two boys behind him. I frowned, shook my head and he grinned. When he did it again, I moved all my stuff off the seat, patted it and he grinned at me and shook his head no. I said, "I want." in Russian. I wasn't sure what else to say, actually, whispering and insisting. He looked sheepish and moved, and I whispered in his ear, "Thank you!". I put my arm around him and patted him on the shoulder and just left my arm there for several minutes.

At the end of the sermon I looked at my cell phone to check the time and realized that the other class would be there any minute, I was going to miss communion. We sang a song and at the end I told this boy that I wanted to leave. He reached up and gave me another big hug and kiss, again to my surprise. Apparently sitting beside me was not that bad of a deal after all. :)

Not all of the kids were in Sunday School. Anna, our team mate's 5 year old daughter was home sick, and her two older siblings were still in the service for about 10 or 15 minutes. And all of the older girls from the orphanage were missing. (This class is very different, experimental actually - they are keeping older and younger siblings together, so I have from 8 to 15 years old in this class of about 15 kids, plus 5, 6 and 10 year old American kids.) Only little 8 year old Zhenia was there, much to her displeasure according to the scowl on her face. But then, Zhenia often scowls, so who knows? Come to find out, the older girls were practicing for a program to be given on Monday in honor of the boys. Monday was 'Men's Day.' Women's Day is such a huge thing here - I mean HUGE. And they have this tiny little celebration for men. I'll have to write about that sometime, too.

So, I started the class. I started the story of Samuel, using the pictures I'd downloaded off the internet. (There is some great stuff on the internet now.) And I realized how much this story could impact these boys. They were a bit rowdy at first, but their caretaker was there at the beginning and they settled down and then - they really got into the story.

Samuel - a boy given away by his mother. No matter how you think of it, no matter how you understand the dynamics of the story, this is the fact - Hannah gave away her child. I make no judgement against her here, none. But those boys understood more than I will ever understand what Samuel may have gone through.

Eli - a father who did not raise his own sons correctly. I know from some of these kids' reactions that some of them have been abused by adults. Not all of these kids are true orphans. In one of the other classes, a boy and his brother were brought to the orphanage one day by their mother. She just dropped them off and no one has seen her since. They can't be adopted because she never gave up her parental rights. I reached out to pat the head of one of the older boys one day, in fun because he was acting silly. I reached - he ducked and cringed away from me in fear - that child has been hit by an adult more than once - it took him a couple seconds to realize I was not going to hit him and then he barely relaxed. I wept inside for him. So, these kids know what it's like to be raised (or not) by not-good parents. I keyed in on the fact that God wants them to be good fathers, when the time comes, that they themselves have a responsibility before God.

Hophni and Phineas - two disobedient sons, two immoral men. God held them responsible for their actions. Their actions and the actions of their servants are very consistent with organized crime here today. The kids understood what it meant to have to pay a bribe, or to have your stuff taken by someone bigger, stronger or with more authority than you. Yet, these two men paid dearly for their sin.

The hour went by really fast. Most of it was taken up with story telling (and translation) and the kids sat quietly. I was surprised at first, but then - then I realized how much hope there is in that story for them. Yes, the main theme was God is spirit and those who worship him much worship in spirit and in truth. But there was much, much more for them to think about as well.

I have prayed and prayed for the older boy. His name is also Vitaly.