Our next door neighbor’s 9 yr old son knocked at the door. I opened to see him and another little boy standing there. Robert asked if it was OK for him to bring a guest to our home fellowship.
“Of course," I said. "You can bring anyone you like.”
“Well," he said, “I’ve been talking to my friend here and he doesn’t know anything about Jesus or the Bible, so I thought it would be good to bring him so he can learn about that.”
I asked the other boy what his name was.
“Elijah.”
“Oh, did you know that there is a very important man in the Bible named Elijah?”
Elijah’s eyes got super big. “REALLY? WOW!”
“Maybe one of these days when you come over we can read the story of Elijah,” I said.
“That would be good. That way I can know about the man I was named after! I will ask my mom and dad to come too.”
The next day we were walking our dog and we saw Elijah and his brothers and mother in their front yard. We walked up and introduced ourselves. Elijah told his mom that we were the ones who had the Bible study at our house. She told us that Elijah had not stopped talking about it. He was so excited about coming. I asked her if she was going to come and she said she would have to talk to her husband. She had a very doubtful look on her face that made me think her husband would probably not want any part of it.
The next day a knock came at the door and I opened to see Elijah and two other boys I had not met standing there.
“Can I bring my friends to the Bible study?” he asked.
“Of course.”
“They don’t know about the Bible.”
“That is OK. We are going to learn about that and you can invite your parents too.”
Elijah added, “and there will be a whole table full of food, right?”
“Sure.” I said. At that point I had no idea who was coming and how much food we would have. I knew I had a giant pack of hot dogs we could Bar-B-Que, so the kids should be good with that.
The meeting was to start at 6pm Friday with a potluck dinner. Friday afternoon Elijah must have come by at least 6 times wanting to talk about the meeting and asking if he could walk our dog. I had to finally tell him that we were very busy getting things ready for tonight and that he needed to not come back until 6:00.
On the dot of 6:00 Elijah came to the door with two friends. Then 2 other boys showed up and then Robert and his parents came. My husband, Jay, came back from picking up 2 other adults and we started the meeting. Before we could begin the meal, a girl came to the door to get her 2 brothers who had to go home. So we were left with Elijah, Robert, Jason and Rudy, all between 7 and 9 years old.
After we ate I went outside with dessert and an “Evangel Cube” which is a great little tool for sharing the gospel. Robert had seen it before so I asked if he would like to help me share it with the others. The boys all sat on the mini trampoline and I sat facing them on a chair. Robert held the cube and moved it from one picture to the next as we talked about how man is separated from God because of sin and how Jesus came to earth and died so that we could be with God. The boys asked lots of questions. They were really into it and very attentive. Robert did a great job and even pointed out how Jesus still has the scars from his crucifixion even now.
During the telling of the gospel, Jason looked up at me and said, “I want to do that. I want to accept Jesus in my heart.” By the end, all 3 of them raised their hand to accept Jesus.
We then went into the house and all of the adults and children gathered together and Jay read the story of how Elijah challenged the prophets of Baal. Elijah, the little boy, was called home before we had gotten very far, so we told him that he could come back another day and we would read him the story.
The next day, about 10:30 in the morning, Elijah came to the door and wanted to know if we could read him the story. Jay told him that he could come back at noon and we would feed him lunch and read the story. At noon he came back with Rudy and another boy we hadn’t met. We called Robert to come over too and we ate the hot dogs that were left from the night before. Then we went into the living room and read the story of Elijah to them. After that, they wanted to share the Evangel Cube with the new boy, Tyler. So I got it out and had all the boys help me tell the story of Jesus to Tyler. They really got into it, sharing different parts that they had remembered from the night before. Tyler asked questions and showed that he was really listening too. Jason said that he would like to learn how to use the cube so that he could take one home and tell his mom about Jesus.
It was really an amazing couple of days with these boys. They were excited about coming back and also want to have a vacation Bible school during the summer. I'll share about our VBS next time.
To learn more about the Evangel Cube, go to http://www.evangecube.org
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