There we were, a group of kids and a few adults, reading a short story about Elisha from 2kings4:38-44. After reading the story (with a few fun actors acting it out 🙃), we took in a deep breath and asked Jesus to show us where He was in this story. The room became still as hands slowly raised. Their hearts were seeing Jesus.
“I saw Jesus. He was close to those ones who had made people sick. They didn’t know. They didn’t mean to do that. He was encouraging their hearts.”
“Elisha stayed. He didn’t run away when everything went bad.”
“Nobody ran. They all were in it together.”
“I saw Him when they ate the soup again.”
“I saw Jesus when they were healed. He was in the soup, making it not poisonous.”
The whole group of us, the young ones and the teachers, we altogether began to talk about so many places we saw Jesus. What measure of faith they would have had to eat the same stew again. How the healing wasn’t in the flour Elisha threw in, as much as in their faith and hearts. We talked about how Jesus makes our hearts new, ridding us of any lies or things that may be poisonous to who we are.
We were learning Him together.
Sometime later we began to pray over our hearts. All the children, the adult helpers… You could feel the pure and full Spirit of Jesus among us. The children began to pray simple sentence prayers:
“I pray bravery for our hearts when it gets hard.”
“I pray loyalty.”
“I pray our hearts be faithful.”
“I pray peace in our hearts.”
And on and on it went…
I didn’t want to stop. It was too precious. My own heart was caught in wide open reception of His Spirit in every prayer.
Oh how I encourage you: Read the Bible with children. Ask them where they see Jesus. They will open you up to experiencing Jesus in the scriptures in ways you have not seen before. Pray with them. Let the simplest prayer, offered in such purity, open your eyes to see Him.