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Becky Ramsey | Author & Children’s Minister
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What is Godly Play?
According to the Godly Play Foundation, Godly Play is a creative and imaginative approach to Christian nurture.
Godly Play is about understanding how each of the stories of God’s people connects with the child’s own experience and relationship with God.
Godly Play respects the innate spirituality of children and encourages curiosity and imagination in experiencing the mystery and joy of God.
Read more about Godly Play here.
How do we do Godly Play at First Baptist Greenville?
Christians of many different denominations use Godly Play and probably do it differently, even within the same denomination. In this blog, I describe Godly Play by sharing the way our church does it. That doesn’t mean that it’s the best way or the prescribed way, or the only way, of course, but it’s the way that suits us best.
What are we here for?
We meet here to talk about Godly Play, to share what it’s all about and to discuss how to do it better.
The weekly blog posts are designed to help Sunday school teachers prepare for their Godly Play lessons, and the individual pages (see the tabs at the top of this page) share information about how we do Godly Play at First Baptist Church, Greenville, SC.
We’d love to hear from teachers everywhere, not just the ones at our church! We hope you’ll join our circle and share your ideas!
What Godly Play is Not
Godly Play is quite different from the traditional model in which the teacher tells the children what they need to know. Godly Play is not about things that are that simple. It is not just about learning lessons or keeping children entertained. It is about locating each lesson in the whole system of Christian language and involving the creative process to discover the depths of meaning in them.
The Good Shepherd and World Communion Sunday
Welcome to The Good Shepherd and World Communion Sunday, scheduled for this Sunday, October 1, 2016. This lesson comes from The Complete Guide to Godly Play, 20 Presentations for Spring, by Jerome Berryman.
How wonderful for our children, who will be celebrating World Communion Sunday in worship, to have a chance to explore this idea of Christ as Shepherd of our world during Sunday school!
It’s a great time to remember the parable of the shepherd and apply this to World Communion Sunday, as well as a time to think deeper about communion-what it is and what it means. It’s a pretty short lesson, so that leaves plenty of time to discuss these big ideas. Children may want to talk about what communion is like for them. At our church some families include children in participating and others prefer that their children wait until they are baptized. It’s good for children to remember that whether or not we join in on the eating and drinking, we can be with God in our prayer during the communion time. God loves and wants to commune with everyone, no matter what.
Ideas for Art Response
- Of course, one response that children will love is to play with the pieces of the story. Children enjoy the story together, telling it to each other in groups of two or three.
2. Make a World Communion Circle for your class. Each child could make their own contribution- a clothespin person or the world out of paper or felt and put it all together.
3. Children could make their own elements from the story: Jesus as Shepherd, the sheep, 
the fence, the table, the chalice or plate.
4. Or children could focus on the World part 
of World Communion Sunday…
The children might enjoy a field trip to look at our world in tiles from a few years back.
5. You could also celebrate communion on your own in your classroom with juice and crackers. Bring me clean receipts and I’m happy to reimburse you!
For more response ideas, visit my Pinterest page on the subject, here.
Enjoy!