ROTATION.ORG WRITING TEAM

JESUS RAISES LAZARUS
CREATIVE WRITING

PASSAGE

Story: John 11:1-44
Memory Verse: John 11:25

PURPOSE

The children will explore people’s feelings in the story of Lazarus and then write poems using metaphors. The children will consider what it feels like to be sad, happy, confused, angry, or one of the other emotions embodied in the story and recognize that Jesus is human and experienced these emotions also.

Objectives for the rotation:

Find the story in the Gospel of John.
Retell the story in their own words.
Know that Jesus is human: he had friends, he felt sadness.
Know that Jesus is God. He performed the miracle of raising Lazarus from the dead, demonstrating his power over sin and death.
Understand that we have a new way of living: Jesus sets us free, unbinding us from our sins.

PREPARATION

Read Bible Background.

Materials List

Bibles
Paper (lined paper for writing drafts; lined or plain paper for final copies)
Pencils or pens (gel pens seem to inspire creativity)
Whiteboard or flipchart and appropriate markers

Advance Preparation Requirements

Find out more about poetry, especially figurative language: http://www.42explore.com/figlang.htm is one source of information.
The lesson plan on metaphors by Jenny Browne at http://www.writenet.org/writers_on_teaching/fwir_jbrowne.html is helpful also.

PRESENTATION

OPEN – INTRODUCTION

Welcome the children and introduce everyone.

Open with prayer, such as: Lord, send your Holy Spirit today to inspire us as we reflect upon your word. Amen.

Tell the class: Today, we are going to look at how the people in our Bible story are feeling – the emotions they are experiencing throughout the story – and then write poetry that captures some of those emotions.

If time permits, read the entire Scripture passage, John 11:1-44. However, if time is short, retell parts of the story interspersed with readings of key Scripture verses: John 11:7-8, 20-27, 32-36, 43-45. As you tell/read the story, ask the children to make note of any feelings the people may have had.

DIG - MAIN CONTENT

Talk about the story. Make a list of feelings that the children noted. Prompt them if any key ones are missing such as fear/worry, sadness, grief, confusion, anger, amazement, joy, love.

Select one of those emotions to focus on for class discussion, such as joy. Ask: “What does “joy” look like?” Replies may include things like smiling, dancing, shouting, and jumping. Talk about how you can tell someone is joyful by his or her actions, but we really can’t see joy – we can’t see what it looks like.

Discuss ways to write a poem that shows feelings that we can’t see – what sort of pictures comes to mind? Allow some time for the children to reflect on this before you take anyone’s answer. Then take their suggestions. Answers for joy might include a singing bird, sun sparkling on water, a new puppy chewing on your fingers. Obviously, this is a very personal thing and there are no right or wrong answers.

These things are called metaphors – a word or phrase used to describe or stand for something that it is not really. There is a metaphor in the Scripture we read – Jesus says Lazarus is “sleeping” when he is actually dead. When we sing “a mighty fortress is our God” and say, “the Lord is my shepherd” we are using metaphors. Point out that metaphors are similar to similes, but a simile uses the word like or as – “as proud as a peacock” and “run like the wind.”

Tell the children they are going to write a poem that paints pictures with words. There are no rules about rhyming or using patterns. The poem should not retell the Bible story. The only rule is that the poem should describe by metaphor one of the feelings in the poem.

Tell the children to select one emotion from the list the class composed earlier. Give each child scratch paper to jot down ideas and then to compose a metaphor poem.

Suggest titles to help the children think about the activity, such as “Jesus Weeps,” “Mary’s Grief,” or “The Disciples Are Worried.” The first line of the poem might be formatted “{feeling} is a _____.” Be careful about giving too many examples, as they may influence and color the children’s work too much.

Allow time for the children to work quietly and independently. Help as needed with spelling and format. This should be a free verse poem – that is, it does not need to rhyme and lines don’t need to be a certain length. However, line breaks should be at meaningful locations – have the children read their poems out loud to see how the lines should break.

If time permits, have the children copy their poems in nice handwriting onto nice paper.

REFLECT - CLOSURE

Ask the students to share their poems with the class.

Discuss:

Have you ever felt any of the emotions we talked about in this story?

Do you feel that Jesus is more able to comfort you because he felt the same things?

What does our memory verse tell us about turning to Jesus with our problems?

I wonder what it means to believe in him?

If you believe in Jesus, do you think he will take your bad feelings and help you deal with your emotions?

Close with prayer.

ADDITIONAL SUGGESTIONS

Adaptations - Younger Children

Work together as a group to write a poem. Agree on an overall theme and allow each child to suggest a line.

Adaptations - Older Children

Demonstrate how to use a thesaurus to find more creative versions of ordinary words. Thesaurus work is best when the students have a specific focus, such as replacing all the “tired” adjectives -- such as nice, warm, sad -- with more descriptive words.

Give the students pencils and scratch paper to jot down ideas as they listen to the Bible story.

SOURCES

Browne, Jenny. Writers on Teaching: “Flowing Metaphors.”
http://www.writenet.org/writers_on_teaching/fwir_jbrowne.html. Teachers and Writers Collaborative, 2006.

Lamb, Annette and Larry Johnson. 4 2 eXplore web site. Article and links on Figurative language. http://www.42explore.com/figlang.htm .

CONTRIBUTOR: Amy Crane