FAITH CHALLENGE
Exile
Week
2: Ice Cream Sundaes
Scripture: 2
Kings 23:31-25:30
Memory Verse: Joshua 1:9 Be strong and
courageous: do not be frightened or dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you
wherever you go. (NRSV)
Concepts:
·
Remembering past crises is one way to help us
avoid future crises
Objectives:
·
Students will review the scripture and exile
story from last week.
·
Students will learn some of the geo-political
reasons for the exile.
·
Students create ice cream sundaes if they can
negotiate all the needed supplies from the various superpowers of ancient
times.
Gathering Time: (Guide and Coach)
1.
At the beginning
of each class, the Coach greets arriving students and supervises snacks.
2.
The Guide and
Coach remind students to write prayer joys and concerns on the Prayer Wall and
to place their offering in the offering jars.
3.
Give each
student an unlabeled map and ask them to fill it in using a labeled map for
their guide. This activity should begin to familiarize them with
the geography for the story.
4.
After most
students have arrived and snacks are ended, the Guide asks the Coach to lead an
opening prayer. This can be brief and may or may not involve the prayer
chain.
Workshop Lesson Procedure: (Guide takes over from
here)
Scripture/Bible Story:
Review the Bible story from last week
by reading the scripture and referring to their maps as they read or, since the scripture is long, the
guide and the students may want to summarize the story instead of reading. Remind students that we learned “what happened”
and “who did it” last week. This week we
will talk about “why.”
The writers of the Old Testament were
preoccupied with the same questions:
Why? Or what does it mean for the faith of Israel
that this happened and that they were so helpless? It’s similar to the familiar question “Why do bad
things happen to good people?” This
destruction, enslavement, and exile was an awful time
and the writers were trying to make some sense of it. They blamed the disasters on the kings and
their decisions. They saw God as the force behind it. Their lesson was for the people to follow God
and they will live long in the Promised Land.
If not, they will be punished.
Today, we see from a different perspective. We have more information than they did at
that time. We have archeological
information plus we have 2000 more years of experience and hindsight.
Application:
Explain that the first part of the lesson today may seem a
little like school (history and geography lesson) but hopefully they will find
the information to be very interesting (as I did). The last part of the lesson will be more
active. Explain that Egypt
(King Neco) and Babylonia (King Nebuchadnezzar) were
battling super powers at the time. They
both wanted control of Carchemish
at the Euphrates River. Look at their filled-in maps. Note where Jerusalem
and Judah are
in relation to Babylon and Egypt--in
the middle! This was one of many battles
that took place in the area.
We will be covering thousands of years of history in
minutes. I want to briefly mention the
beginning --the Garden of Eden, because it has relevance to our story
(location, location, location). Scholars
believe the Garden of Eden, which was described as having four rivers, was the
area that was fed by the Tigress and Euphrates
Rivers in Mesopotamia
and the Blue and White Nile Rivers
that flow into the Nile (Map 14).
People lived in this area because of the availability of
water and the fertility of the land. The
mountainous area along the Mediterranean
Coast (Palestine)
received a lot of rainfall and was also fertile. This whole area is known as the Fertile
Crescent. Lightly shade in
the Fertile Crescent on your map (See Map 4). For reference, Map 5 shows the Fertile
Crescent in modern times.
The Fertile Crescent is in Iraq.
Three spheres of peoples and lands meet in the Holy
Land (Palestine) (Map 15).
Civilization began here. The first city, Jericho,
and other first cities known to archeologists, were built in this area. Draw these lines on your map so that they all
intersect in the Holy Land (Palestine.) In the future, I will refer to the Holy
Land as Palestine. Judah,
where our story mainly takes place, is in the southern part of Palestine. It includes Israel
as well.
Map 11 shows the
economy of the Ancient East. Egypt
had perfume, gold, textiles, River Nile.
Babylon had the Tigress and Euphrates
Rivers, biggest trade city. Arabia had perfume and
incense. (Imagine how smelly it must
have been back then with sheep, horses, camels, and no daily showers. Perfume
and incense must have been in high demand! )
Assyria had military force. Persia
connected this part of the world with the Far East. Palestine
had things to offer as well. (Map
12) Cedar trees were exported from Lebanon
for building. A beautiful purple dye was
made from shells near Tyre. Palestine was located on the trade routes between these powers and important
commercial areas. It was the
crossroads of the Ancient World. People
in Palestine sold food, places to
stay, (I always wondered why little Bethlehem
had inns.) and other wares to the traveling traders. The super powers wanted and fought for
control of these trade routes. Many
times they destroyed cities and took the leaders (military, priests, royalty, craftsmen,
etc.) as captives/slaves. They used the
slaves to build and lead/teach in their cities.
Only the poor were not deported.
They were left to tend to the crops and vineyards.
The following is a brief timeline
of super powers who conquered and controlled Palestine
during these ancient times:
From the south, Ancient Egypt
dominated this area (Genesis, Exodus, and Kings) immediately prior to the 600’s BC, which is when this month’s
scripture begins. Trivia: Egyptians built canals, made linen textiles, glass,
perfume, mined gold. Religion: many
gods. Main God, Sun God. King was chief priest. Believed in life after
death, which led to the building of elaborate tombs, pyramids, and mummies. See
map and information included from World Book.
Assyria, to the north, was a land of rolling
hills. The Assyrians have been called
the Romans of Asia because they were great conquerors. They won their victories by superb
organization, weapons, and equipment.
They conquered the Fertile Crescent area and Egypt
in the 600’s BC. Because their
expansion was costly, Judah and Chaldea
and Babylonia began to regain independence. (Kings)
Trivia: They spoke a language
related to Hebrew and Arabic. Archeology
shows that there were people in Assyria in the New Stone
Age (Neolithic period), 6000 to 7000 years ago. They used the first writing
system, called cuneiform. They were
neighbors with Babylonia and Egypt
until Assyria conquered them. Religion: many gods controlled human
destiny, sky, earth, storms, and fire. Believed in good and evil spirits and magic. Worshipped god of military
power and empire, Ashur. Assyria
named for Ashur. See map and information included from World Book.
Babylon,
capital of Babylonia, was the largest commercial trade
center at that time. Babylonia, to the west of Palestine,
along the Tigress and Euphrates Rivers
produced the first form of writing cuneiform, a set of laws, studies in math
and science. Began
using wheeled carts and chariots around 3000BC. In the 600’s
BC Assyria took control and destroyed Babylon.
By 605 BC Babylonia began to rise in power defeating Egypt
and Judah. Babylon
was rebuilt by King Nabopalasser and his son Nebuchannezar (probably used some
of the columns etc. from King Solomon’s temple and palace in their city and Hanging
Gardens, one of Ancient Seven
Wonders of the World.) The Edomites, Moabites, and Ammonites were
tribes that Babylonia already dominated. Nebuchadnezzar enlisted them to fight the
people in Judah
for control. See map and information included from World Book.
Persia, from further west, (Present-day Iran and Afghanistan)
became a vast empire under Cyrus and Darius I in the 500’sBC conquering Babylon,
Assyria, Palestine,
and Egypt. Good organizers and administrators. Treated their subjects
better than their earlier rulers.
(Freed Jews.) Allowed the
rebuilding of the temple. Trivia:
Used cuneiform and developed pony express mail. Religion: before 1400BC believed in many
gods. No temples, offered sacrifices on mountains. Between 1400 and 1000BC a prophet named
Zoroaster, reformed the religion. He
preached a faith based on good deeds, thoughts, and words and a supreme God
called the “wise spirit.” See map and information included from World
Book.
If there is time and interest, the guide can fast forward to
the 1900’s AD. Arabs controlled this area. During the Nazi persecution in the 1930’s
many Jewish refugees went to Palestine. After World War II, the UN made Israel
an independent nation. This made the Arabs there mad and fighting broke out.
Pictures show Arab refugees. See map and information included from World
Book.
And in 2003 AD,
there is still fighting in this area. See map from Time magazine.
Application:
Students will participate in an activity that will hopefully
demonstrate some of the lesson. They
will make ice cream sundaes. However, they will be required to work
together (or against) one another to get all the things they need for the
sundaes. The goal is to obtain all their items for their sundaes from the other
students.
Divide students into 5 groups. Assign students to go to 5 parts of the room
(4 corners and middle) to represent areas in and around the Ancient Middle
East:
Back left of room will represent Lebanon
and its cedar trees. Give those students
all of the bowls for the sundaes.
Back right of the room will represent Assyria
and Babylonia and the spices they obtained from the Far
East. Give that group the
whipped cream. Also give those students
4 “weapons” (4 note cards with “weapon” written on each) which can be used
together to take over a whole group or one weapon can win one student and
whatever that student owns at the time.
Front right of the room will represent Arabia
and its perfume/incense. Give them the
chocolate syrup (or chocolate chips).
Front left of the room will be Egypt’s
linen, gold, etc. Give them all of the spoons.
The students in the middle of the room (Palestine)
will be at the table with the ice cream and scoops.
Give each student 2 coins. (note
cards with coin written on each)
The students are to obtain the items for their sundaes. Beg,
borrow, conquer, buy, trade. Let the game begin!
Rules: Each
student must go through this middle area (Palestine) to get to any of the other areas or to
make any trades. They must pay one
item or coin each time they pass through the middle of the room.
Each item can be traded for another item. Example: one spoon can be traded for one
serving of chocolate syrup. Each item is
worth one coin.
No one can eat until they have gotten all parts of their
sundae.
There are no more rules.
The students will probably make up rules as the game goes on. Behavior does not have to be Christian
like. Chaos and confusion may prevail
much as it did in those ancient times.
After 5 minutes or
so, end the activity. Did everyone
get an even amount? No! Let everyone finish making his/her sundae and
sit down. While eating, discuss how this
activity was like the scripture story or history lesson. Did some become aggressive while some were
oppressed? This sundae making shows how
the economy of the Middle East influenced history. It also shows many sides of the human
character—the passions, the greed or selfishness, the need for power, survival,
and others. Ask for any other
comparisons.
Wrap-up:
- The Old Testament writers asked why the invasions and deportations? They believed that God had directed the
happenings and events based on the kings’ and/or people’s decisions and
actions. We are remembering their
pain almost three thousand years later.
Today we learned the geopolitical reasons why. What is our message? What do we feel in
our hearts that we could learn
from the scripture lesson, geography lesson, (and sundae making)? We can learn about human nature, human
needs and passions. We can learn
about power. What can we learn from that?
We can learn to be careful what we do to gain power or what we
want. Think about what some people
do and say on the radio and TV for money/power. We can also learn about mercy. If we are the person in power, we must
have mercy on those who are weaker.
(If time allows, the guide can list above on chart paper.) George Washington Carver once said
something like, Be helpful to the old, young, and weak. You will be one of those
yourself.
- Post the “visual” on the timeline.
3. Ask
students to tidy up. Collect booklets
for later use unless a student asks to keep theirs.
Closing (Coach):
1. The
Coach conducts the closing prayer time.
All students and adults gather around the prayer chain. The Coach begins and ends the prayer. The Coach asks each student to contribute a
joy, thanksgiving or concern in turn.
2. Close/lock
the door and turn off the lights.
Guide preparation in advance:
1. Become
familiar with the scripture, geography and history as noted above and on the
run-off map sheets. I know it is a
lot. It can be abbreviated. The pages from the World Book are to show
maps of the empires.
2. Supply
List
1 gallon of vanilla ice cream
1 bottle of chocolate syrup
2 cans of whipped cream
Chart paper for Wrap-up
Pencils (Optional: Colored pencils) for students to fill in
their maps
Need one of the following for each student:
Blank map
Copies of the maps
referred to and stapled together to make an atlas booklet (after the lesson,
keep these booklets for later use).
Optional: Overhead projector and transparency of each of the
maps in the booklet
Bowls
Spoons
2 Coin cards for each student
1 weapon card per person plus 4 more
References
FC notes by Susan Mazzara
World Book
Encyclopedia
The Macmillan Bible
Atlas, Third Edition
Time magazine