The Widow's Oil

Lucy Moore

On your marks:

We don't often expect children to exercise the gift of hospitality, but there's no reason why they shouldn't get into practice earlier rather than later. Most children love acting as hosts either in play or for real. This wonderful story from 1 Kings 17 is an inspiration to open up our homes and share whatever we have with each other, so that God can work miracles.
This story ties into the The Barnabas Children’s Bible series through the Big Story of Famine and Feast.

Get set:

You'll need ingredients and equipment for making unleavened (flat) bread (find details online or in a book), Bibles for an older group, hospitality resources if desired (see point 5 below).

Go!

1. Ask when the children have been round to someone's home for tea, or when they've had somebody round for tea. Another word for this is 'hospitality', which is nothing to do with hospitals, but is about being a 'host' to someone—welcoming a friend or (for grown-ups) a stranger into your home. And God loves it when people are hospitable: he can do some of his most wonderful miracles when people are hospitable to each other. Obviously, children don't have your own homes yet that belong just to you, but even now you can enjoy being hospitable to people, so that you can enjoy being part of God's miracles.

2. Make some unleavened bread together. As the children knead the dough, tell them the story of Elijah and the widow of Zarephath from 1 Kings 17. There is a version in the Barnabas Bible (175).

3. Make the dough into shapes of loaves or Elijah-shaped or widow-shaped and bake them. Ask some open-ended questions such as:
I wonder how the widow felt when Elijah asked her for food?
I wonder why she was prepared to share her last bit of food with him?
I wonder how her son felt when he saw his mother take some food to Elijah?
I wonder what you would say if someone asked you to share your last food with them?
I wonder why God sent Elijah to the widow and didn't just give him food on his own?
I wonder what is your favourite part of this story?

4. Ask what other stories (Bible stories or other stories) they can think of in which someone invites someone else into their home for food. Here are a few: Abram, Sarai and the three strangers (Genesis 18); Boaz and Ruth (Ruth), Abigail and David (1 Samuel 25); Jesus, Mary and Martha (Luke 10:38-41); Jesus and Zacchaeus (Luke 19:1-10); Paul and Lydia (Acts 16:11-15). If your children are old enough to enjoy some independent research, ask them to discover what good things God made happen out of these examples of hospitality.

5. If possible, find a way of showing hospitality to other people after your session: could you serve tea up to the rest of church or to carers as they collect the children? (They might need some warning to allow time.) Could you bake a cake together and invite another group round to eat it—the MU, the younger children or youth group perhaps? Could you organize a party? Could you serve coffee after the church service? Could you organize a safari meal around the group, each course being eaten in a different house?

6. Either eat the bread figures or use them to demonstrate your hospitality to others (though, given the usual state of dough figures, it might be kinder to let the children eat them themselves rather than inflicting them on others.) Say a prayer before you eat them, asking God to help you all to enjoy the miracles he brings out of being hospitable to other people.

You could look at 2 Kings 4:42-44 and, more remotely, Matthew 14:13-21; 15:32-38; Mark 6:30-44; Luke 9:10-17; John 6:1-14.

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