Open Day - Church History Work Shop

MIDDLE AGES
On the 24th of July, 2018, Christian Liberty Books hosted another home educators’ Open Day. The theme was Church History. Dr. Peter Hammond held the parents and young adults programme in the boardroom. He covered a Survey of the first 1500 Years of Church History, focusing mainly on the Middle Ages! There is a lot more interesting centuries still to be covered in events to come!

​​THE GREATEST COMMANDMENT
I ran a concurrent children’s program, with assistance from Alieske van’t Voort, Alpha Alembe, Vicky Young and Marina Graser. Alpha started the morning with a devotion on The Greatest Commandment from Matthew 22:37-39, “Jesus replied: ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’” After this we sang a song about the Greatest Commandment and the Great Commission with actions to memorise the “memory verse” of the day: Matthew 22:37-39. We then linked these to the purpose of the Church, which then helped us flow naturally into Church History.

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GOD’S PEOPLE IN HIS SERVICE
I immediately got started on the Church History and broke it down explaining that the “Church” is a translation of the Greek word ‘ekklesia’ which means being called out, so the Church is not just a building, but rather those who are called out of the world to be God’s children in His service. The Church is God’s body and His bride. We then discussed what History is, and how it’s important to know our history, so that we can learn from the past in order to do better in the present and future. I made an illustration of how, if I wanted to bake a cake, I would use the recipe of someone who had already figured out the perfect mixture and method, rather than knowing that I need eggs, flour, milk, cocoa powder, salt and then deciding to put 1 tsp of flour, 49 eggs, 4 Tbs of Cocoa, 8l of milk and 2kgs of salt. So we saw how it was very important to rather learn from other’s mistakes and successes in the past. So then we put the two back together and found that Church History is the story of God’s people getting together in His Service from the beginning until now.

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PERPETUA
We then moved on to some interesting characters in different eras of Church History. We started with Perpetua, the courageous 2nd century martyr in Tunisia, North Africa. Perpetua had such a strong identity as a Christian, a daughter of Christ. So we then played a game, in which we ran around asking each other ‘yes/no’ questions, trying to discover our given hidden identity. We also discussed how we, as believers, get our identity in Christ and not from the thoughts or words of our friends and those around us.
 
PATRICK
Rev. John Clifford then gave an exciting rendition about St Patrick, the missionary to Ireland who was kidnapped by pirates. We did some painting and Irish dancing, before marching off to lunch singing the Romans 6:23 Marching Song.

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MARTIN LUTHER
After refueling our energy tanks, we then moved onto Martin Luther, the spark that God used to ignite the Reformation. After watching the Torchlighter’s film on Luther, we then made our own scrolls containing ideas of what changes are needed in the Church today, and afterwards got dizzy playing Pin-the-95-Theses-on-the-Door. This was filled with much fun and games!
 
MARY SLESSOR
We ended the day with Alieske giving a presentation on Mary Slessor, the fiery Scottish Missionary to Nigeria. We then built our own little “mud huts” like the one’s the people from Calabar lived in. The children got very creative with banana-leaf walls and colourful roofs. Alpha even taught them how to authenticaly weave with banana tree leaves.

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THE ENJOYMENT OF LEARNING
The day was interspersed with many more action-packed games and exciting prizes, as well as breaks for juice and biscuits. The laughter and fun just didn’t stop. Finally Home Time came and we had to peel the last few unwilling little bodies away from the fun, fellowship and games. We look forward to continuing with more follow up events with more Historic examples of excellence and way more games and arts and crafts!

THANK YOU
Thank You to our Lord for His protecting hand over these kiddies and for being our continued joy and strength. Thank You also to all those who attended the event from near and far, and all those who lent a helping hand with beautiful smiles! We look forward to seeing you all again soon!
 
By His Grace
Emma Vaughan-Jones