Streetwise Holiday Club

Date: 1315223940

STREETWISE HOLIDAY CLUB

Streetwise, our Holiday Club for children aged 5 to 10, ran from 31st August to 2nd September!

The sound of voices, music and laughter filled the premises of St Paul’s as nearly 50 children and 30 helpers entered into the adventure of the Streetwise Holiday Club.  Each child belonged to a den which was to be found somewhere along Luke Street.  490 Luke Street, a middle eastern workshop was where you would find the oldest children.  Other children could be found in the donkey park, the bread shop, the fish shop and the shepherd’s supply shop.

Here they made all sorts of things appropriate for anyone living in Luke Street.  The Bread Shop made bread and there was a Specials board which this den shared with the other children – such as jam tarts or warm bread rolls.  The donkey park made donkey heads and carrots for them to eat.

The children played games, such as an obstacle race which involved trying to carry objects on a stretcher (it was hard to carry the lame man to Jesus) or stealing coins from a blindfolded person (as Zacchaeus robbed the poor to make himself rich).

The children made houses out of shoeboxes and lots of other things to put inside their house.  There was never enough time to do everything but we made time to look at the Bible and to talk with God.  The bread shop even had a prayer baguette!

Everything that we did was focussed around the homes that Jesus visited in Luke Street (some of the ones found in Luke’s gospel). We came altogether twice in the morning to sing, burst with energy, watch a DVD and hear how Jesus went to these homes:

• the paralysed man who came into the house through the hole in the roof
• Zacchaeus, the unpopular tax-collector, who invited Jesus to his home
• the friends of Jesus who didn’t recognise him when he walked along the road with them after he had come alive again.  They invited him in for supper!

All these people came to meet Doctor Luke because they had a problem, and Jesus did far more for them than the doctor ever could.

The young people in 490 Luke Street made a series of television interviews about these people who welcomed Jesus.  The Learn and Remember verse summed up all that we had been learning: Jesus replied, “I did not come to invite good people to turn to God.  I came to invite sinners.” Luke 5:32 – in other words, he came for those people who knew that they just weren’t good enough for God and needed him to forgive them (and 35 children learnt that verse by heart!).

The children chatted about what they had done.  The team members enthused about the morning.  Roll on next holiday club, sometime in 2012!