Children and Families - Scripture Union NZ

  This Lent/Easter season, we have a series of intergenerational services for your church to download and use. These services have been written by our Children and Families Team and used in churches. This season in the church calendar is a very important one to share together as an intergenerational community and we want to support you in this.  Download one of our services, or get in touch with us if you would like us to run a service for you. We love getting out and about and supporting your ministry.  Intergenerational Services:  The rocks will cry out: Palm Sunday The Mercy Tree: Good Friday The Colours of Easter: Easter Sunday Breakfast on the Beach: Jesus appears to the disciples  More Easter resources

**This is episode one of a serial story, leading right up to Easter. This story is written to share as a family or with your church community. You can find the rest of the story by clicking on the 'Easter' ta b above. You will find the pi ctures to be downloaded, as well as a little Easter booklet to print and share .  ____________________________ Step with me back in time, over 2000 years back. Look around you. The land is dotted with olive trees, their silvery foliage swaying with the gentle breeze. It's warm, not too hot. The full on blaze of summer hasn't arrived yet, but the harshness of winter is fading.  The fields are tinged with green, with the olive trees providing shade for weary travellers. You sit down on one of the many rocks scattered all over the fields. They are everywhere! And sh epherds have used them to create walls and holding pens for animals, and the structure of their simple houses.  The journey towards Easter is just beginning....

These are a handful of quick ideas you can use to explore the Christmas story with children. They accompany photographs that I took in Israel in 2011, but you can google your own images as well. __________________________________________________________________ Map it!   The places mentioned in the Christmas story were not well known in Jesus day. But they sure became famous! We know about Bethlehem, Nazareth and the hill country of Judea because they all feature in the biblical story of Christmas. It's helpful for children to know where these places are. That way they don't seem like a fairy tale. Bethlehem is not in a land far far away, but is a real place.  Activities: Print out black and white maps of Israel. Give the children gold star stickers to mark the places mentioned in the Christmas story. Provide an atlas or google maps to help you.    Click here for a free black and white map.  Click here for an interactive colour map....

J oseph kn ows what he ha s to do. He ha s stood a nd watch ed that day, as the rocks broke and the sun faded from view . He ha s watched as Jesus had di ed. And now he kn ows what he ha s to do.  Joseph , not Jesus' Dad, another Joseph, has a tomb. And he wa nts to honour Jesus by burying him in his tomb. He doesn't want Jesus to en d up like the criminals who have died th at day, cast into a heap by the Roman s. Discarded like rubbish.  Jesus is not rubbish to be tossed away. So, Joseph pushes his way through the cr owds on the road and finds his way to where Pilate is. He has a strange request to make. And he is in a hurry. It is just about time for the Sabbath, when every Jewish pe rso n stops working. He must get to Pilate be fore then.  Pilate is pretty surprised to see Joseph, and even more surprised when he hears that Joseph wants Jesus' body. "Is he dead already?" Pilate asks. He send s off some soldiers to check . When they report back...