Last night we returned to the families in the big city. I began, as usual, by asking someone to tell the story from last week. I started the story and before I got too far, someone else had taken over. Then the story was finished by another. I was satisfied with the retention of the story. I then told the narrative of Christ's resurrection from Luke 24, with the story of Thomas in John 20 tacked on. The story worked well, because even though it was the length of a chapter, there was re-telling inside the story itself. First the women at the tomb, then the two followers of Jesus walking to Emmaus (who retold to Jesus the story of the women at the tomb), then the arrival of the two followers of Jesus to the place where the apostles were and Jesus appearing and showing his wounds. Finally Jesus appearing again and showing his wounds specifically to Thomas.
I had some difficulty telling the second part of the story because our babies making noise, but this probably bothered me more than them. After asking them to retell the story, we talked about the events of the story. Our discussion was more on what Jesus did and said. What did Jesus say about the scriptures? What did Jesus say about their disbelief? What did Jesus do to help them believe? What did Jesus do to help them understand the scriptures? What did Jesus say they were witnesses of? What did he tell them to wait for?
I asked them what they thought of the story. Le asked me a question. "Why didn't Jesus appear to Caiaphas and the Pharisees that condemed him?" I thought it was a key question, because Le had identified with the pharasees early in the stories, he doubted Jesus and didn't want to believe in him. Le had worked through why the Pharisees rejected Jesus, and decided that he would not reject Jesus for the same reason. I asked him. "Do you think it would have helped them believe in Jesus?" He said that it probably would not have, and was satisfied with that answer. I asked them if they believe that Jesus is the Son of God and that he rose from the dead. They said that they did. We prayed together to end the Bible study and agreed to meet again next week.
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