When the Church asked us to have two adults in every primary classroom, that meant I'm joining my wife for sunbeams (3-4 year olds) every week until someone manages to scrounge up a second teacher. Today Joy asked me to prepare to share our Lord's parable of the prodigal son. The lesson was about recognizing our God-given emotions and so I had a set of pictures with a happy, sad, angry, or scared face to work with.
It was a new and very deeply moving experience for me. Not only retelling, but walking the kids through the emotions of the people - how sad the father was that his younger son had left, wondering if he would ever see him again, the joy of the return; the youth's fear as he wondered where his next meal would come from and his sorrow for the hurt he had caused himself, his father, and possibly others, his shame at who he had become; his brother's jealousy and anger. I was telling the story to them fresh and new - as far as they were concerned hearing it for the first time because even though I know JT has heard it multiple times before, long-term memory is not a 4 year old's forte.
It was powerful. I wept. Twice, just a little. I know those people our Savior described. I've seen those families or been those characters. I've tasted just a little tiny piece of their pain and rejoiced with them too.
How unmatched and glorious are these vignettes He has given us! And how glad I was to be in primary today!
It was a new and very deeply moving experience for me. Not only retelling, but walking the kids through the emotions of the people - how sad the father was that his younger son had left, wondering if he would ever see him again, the joy of the return; the youth's fear as he wondered where his next meal would come from and his sorrow for the hurt he had caused himself, his father, and possibly others, his shame at who he had become; his brother's jealousy and anger. I was telling the story to them fresh and new - as far as they were concerned hearing it for the first time because even though I know JT has heard it multiple times before, long-term memory is not a 4 year old's forte.
It was powerful. I wept. Twice, just a little. I know those people our Savior described. I've seen those families or been those characters. I've tasted just a little tiny piece of their pain and rejoiced with them too.
How unmatched and glorious are these vignettes He has given us! And how glad I was to be in primary today!
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