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ART and CONSTRUCTION Workshop Lessons & Ideas for Ezra &/or Nehemiah

This topic is for posting your Art Workshop lessons and Ideas for teaching about Ezra and Nehemiah, or just Ezra, or just Nehemiah.

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Nehemiah Construction Workshop

Summary of Lesson Activities:

  • Build the wall of Jerusalem with Lego or Mega Block or Boxes

Scripture References:

the book of Nehemiah

Key Verse:

Nehemiah 13:14 “Remember me for this, O my God, and do not blot out what I have so faithfully done for the house of my God and its services.”

Rotation Objectives:

At the end of the Rotation, kids should be able to…

  • Know who Nehemiah was and what he accomplished.
  • Summarize the book of Nehemiah.
  • Know that God will help us when we ask.
  • Realize how important it is to read the Bible and how fortunate we are to have access to the Bible.

Leader Preparation:

  • Read Bible Background and scripture.
  • Gather the materials.

Materials List

  • You will need a large, open floor space to build the wall.
  • Gather as many building blocks (Lego, Mega Block, etc.) as you think necessary to rebuild the wall.
  • Painters or masking tape.
  • Download a diagram of the walls of Jerusalem. A good source is http://www.gods-word-first.org...h-jerusalem-map.html - "Jerusalem at the Time of Nehemiah."


Presentation

Opening-Welcome and Lesson Introduction:

Greet the children and introduce yourself.

Open with a prayer.

Dig - Main Content & Reflection

Begin by giving a summary of the book of Nehemiah. Focus on the building of the wall and why it was important to Nehemiah and the people of Jerusalem.

  • Walls provided protection for cities in the days before airplanes and bombs. What do WE do in our day to protect our people?  
  • What does the CHURCH do to offer "protection" to people?  
  • How does God's Word "protect"?

Talk about the problems that Nehemiah faced – the rebuilding, the oppression of the poor, and the disobedience of the people. At one point, Nehemiah had the people working with a brick in one hand and a spear in the other in case of attack.

Next show the students the diagram of the map of Jerusalem.

Point out the different gates and discuss how they were used. The Jesus Plus Nothing Website link  has some good information about the gates and their uses.

Tell the kids that we will be building the wall of Jerusalem out of blocks. To start, tape out on the floor the general shape of the walls. The tape will serve as a guideline for building the wall.

Assign different sections to different children, just like Nehemiah did. Have them build the wall.

Questions for discussion:

  • Why was it important to rebuild the wall of Jerusalem?
  • How do you think Nehemiah got everyone to work together?
  • Do you think it was hard or easy for Nehemiah? Why?
  • How did God help him?
  • How can God help us when we have a big problem that we need to solve?

Closing:

End with a prayer.


Written by Deborah Ward
Williams Lake Church of the Nazarene

Waterford, MI

Copyright 2010 Williams Lake Church of the Nazarene, Waterford, MI
Permission to copy materials granted for non-commercial use provided credit is given and all cited references remain with this material

A representative of Rotation.org reformatted this post to improve readability.

Printed from https://www.rotation.org






Nehemiah Art Workshop

Summary of Lesson Activities:

Making a Pictorial Scroll of Nehemiah

Scripture References:

the book of Nehemiah

Key Verse:

Nehemiah 13:14 “Remember me for this, O my God, and do not blot out what I have so faithfully done for the house of my God and its services.”

Rotation Objectives:

At the end of the Rotation, kids should be able to…

  • Know who Nehemiah was and what he accomplished.
  • Summarize the book of Nehemiah.
  • Know that God will help us when we ask.
  • Realize how important it is to read the Bible and how fortunate we are to have access to the Bible.

Leader Preparation:

  • Read Bible Background and scripture.
  • Gather the materials.

Materials List

  • Long sheets of brown butcher paper
  • Crayons or markers
  • Tape
  • Dowel rods or PVC pipe
  • Optional: Glue sticks and glitter

Advance Preparation Requirements

  • Prepare a scroll: Crumple and flatten and re-crumple a piece of butcher paper. Tape two short ends of a long piece of this paper to dowel rods or PVC pipes.


Presentation

Opening-Welcome and Lesson Introduction:

Greet the children and introduce yourself.

Open with a prayer.

Dig - Main Content & Reflection:

Begin by giving a summary of the book of Nehemiah. Tell the kids that after the wall had been built, the people wanted Ezra to read to read them the Law of Moses, what we know as the first five books of the Bible.

Most of these people had probably not heard or read these books before. These books tell the story of how Israel became a nation and the rules that God expected them to follow. As the people heard the law, they began to cry because they knew that they were not following it. The books were very important for teaching them how to live to please God.

The books that Ezra read did not look like our books of today. Back then books were called scrolls, and they looked a little bit like this.

Hold up your sample scroll.  a brown paper scroll

Scrolls were very expensive. To read a scroll, you unroll it to the part that you want.

Today we are going to make our own scroll to remind us of the story of Nehemiah. We are not going to copy all of the words from Nehemiah, but that is what they would have had to do in Nehemiah's day if they wanted another copy of the book.

We are going to draw pictures of the main parts of the story. Another thing - Hebrew writing goes from right to left, instead of left to right, so we are going to draw our pictures from right to left too.

Pass out supplies. Show the kids how to tape the ends of the paper to the rods so that the scroll can roll up around them.

If you repeatedly crumple the butcher paper, it will begin to turn soft like parchment.

Then have them draw the story using markers or crayons.

You can also decorate the scroll like a medieval scroll making designs using VERY THIN patches of glue from a glue stick and the use of glitter.

Some suggestions of the pictures that they can draw:

  • Nehemiah hears the news that Jerusalem's wall is in ruins and prays that God will help him solve this problem.
  • The king sends Nehemiah to rebuild the wall of Jerusalem
  • The people begin to build the wall under Nehemiah's leadership.
  • Sanballat and Tobiah (enemies of the Jews) oppose Nehemiah rebuilding the wall.
  • Nehemiah helps the poor.
  • The wall is finished.
  • Ezra reads the law to the people.
  • The Israelites confess their sins and promise to obey God.

When everyone is finished, have the kids show off their artwork.

Questions for discussion:

  • What kind of books do you like to read? Why?
  • Why do you think that the Israelites reacted so strongly when they heard the Bible being read? Many of them had not heard the law before.
  • Why is important that we read the Bible?
  • What can we learn from reading the Bible?

Closing:

End with a prayer.


Sources:



Written by Deborah Ward
Williams Lake Church of the Nazarene

Waterford, MI

Copyright 2010 Williams Lake Church of the Nazarene, Waterford, MI
Permission to copy materials granted for non-commercial use provided credit is given and all cited references remain with this material

Images in this post are in the Public Domain, via www.wpclipart.com

A representative of Rotation.org reformatted this post to improve readability.

Printed from https://www.rotation.org

Last edited by Luanne Payne
Original Post
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