OT Mini Lesson 5 Crosthwaite School

On Wednesday afternoon I was once again over at Crosthwaite School, it was the final lesson in OT Mini.  I did a quick recap of the events so far before explaining that the united kingdom of Israel had split up into 10 1/2 tribes in the north and the remaining 11/2 in the south and that is how it was for the next 400 or so years.  I reminded the children of the role prophets had in that sometimes the people would talk to them and they would take it to God - but more often it was God talking to them with messages for the people.  I pointed out that those messages were directed to the people in the south as well as the north sometimes to both.  Moving on I then told them what happened to the people in the north when the Assyrian army came in and scattered them (as the prophets had said they would), next we heard about the Babylonians taking over the Assyrians who then took over Judah in the south putting them into exile.  The people were exiled until the Persians took control and during that time people started the return to Judah.  All the stories for this week involved people during this time period people like Daniel and then Esther.  I covered the three different groups of people that made a return Zerubbabel worked to restore  and rebuild the temple, Ezra worked to teach the people about the law and the use of the temple while Nehemiah rebuilt the walls and the gates around Jerusalem.  Here the Old Testament stops for us until the New Testament starts some 400 or so years later.  So we wait...for Christ.  I had a number of children joining in with actions and acting out various parts during the lesson which was great to see their enthusiasm.  I sent them away with a copy of Andy Robb's 40 OT Mini Bible Stories and said it is one thing to have me talk about the stories it is something else to read them and discover them for themselves.