Bringing the Bible into school
Last term the Children's and Youth Teams delivered Easter assemblies in 40 Birmingham schools. With the summer term opportunities to go in and share and discuss the Bible continue.
At the end of last term the Youth Team delivered 66 Easter assemblies and 28 lessons at over 30 secondary schools. This was done with growing numbers of local church partners as well as BCM volunteers.
With the summer term opportunities to go into schools to share and discuss the Bible's story of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus continue. GSUS Live is a project that delivers Jesus's teachings on fear, rejection and forgiveness, and how he experienced these, in the classroom. In the lessons students also consider how they would advise someone facing these issues. The Youth Team brought GSUS Live to the Streetly Academy and John Henry Newman Catholic College in April and in May they will visit Broadway Academy. One teacher said:
‘It has been such a lovely week having you and the team in. Really appreciate you sharing your stories, being so open and honest. I think the students have benefitted from this and will be encouraged to open up too.'
A Year 7 boy said, ‘I have learnt a lot about Christianity. It’s made me think... that miracles do happen and that God is real and that heaven is real. I once was afraid of death. Now that I know more about Christianity I barely worry about death now.’
Another Year 7 student came to the team following a lesson wanting to offload about being called bad names by peers. It was good to be able to listen, support her and link her up with pastoral staff within the school.
That's just the secondary schools. Last term the Children's Team delivered 14 Easter assemblies in 10 primary schools. This coming term they will lead 170 assemblies altogether. The theme is 'Courage' and the story of Gideon who, although he was scared, trusted God and had the courage to face the massive Midianite army with just 300 men.
