I did an assembly today. I had roughly 15 minutes to explain the concept of God’s love to 5-8 year olds. We started talking about Easter (Jesus died, got put in a tomb and came back to life), the reason Jesus did that and then we finished with a very energetic song. Love working with children!
Anyway, the reason Jesus died on the cross was because he loved us. Jesus died because he loved all of us. And there is enough love to go around.
In the past I’ve used a candle to show how God’s love spreads. If you start with one lit candle and light another from it, the light spreads without getting dimmer. Works especially well ina dark room.
But today we did it a little differently. I had a piece of paper with the words ‘God’s love’ written on it. So I, personally, had 4 corners of God’s love. And because I was being generous and didn’t really need 4 corners, I cut a corner off and gave it to one of the children. So they had one corner of God’s love, and I had 3, right? Except that’s not how it works. By cutting one corner off, I created 2 more. So my 4 corners became 5. And the one I cut off? Well, that actually had 3 corners.
So I cut another corner off. 4 minus 2 equals… that’s right, 6. I was now holding 6 corners, and there were another 6 corners in the room. They cut their in half and I cut more corners off and pretty soon we had 27 corners of God’s love.
I know it’s simplistic, I know you can’t equate love to corners. Except… isn’t that quite an accurate portrayal of God’s love? The more we share it with the people around us, the more of God’s love is around? The more people who know that God loves them, the more people act with love. And it multiplies exponentially. Imagine what the world would be like if we all shared that love, and the people we shared it with accepted it and shared it with others.
Love is a key theme that runs throughout the bible, from Genesis to Revelations. It is constant and unconditional. Sometimes we can over complicate things in order to make them seem sophisticated and grown up. But maybe God’s love is as simple as the corners of the piece of paper. The more you share it, the more you have.
The Reason for my Hope Blog 