Introduction:
This is a series of ten ideas about the Bible story of the encounter between Jesus and the rich youngster that you can use. These ideas come from Martine Versteeg from www.kliederkerk.nl (the Dutch version of Messy Church). Messy church is a new form of being a church for children and the people around them. It's inspired by the English Messy Church.
In this story Jesus says that it's really hard for a rich person to be part of Gods new world. You'll have a bigger chance of seeing a camel go through the eye of a needle. Pooh, that seems impossible!
An explanation that gets used often, is that there's a small gate in the city wall of Jerusalem (where this story got told) that got called: 'the eye of the needle'. When the big gates were closed, people could still go through that small gate. A camel had a hard time going through it, but it was possible if you would take off all it's luggage and if he'd walk on his knees.
In this idea we're going to find out how it is to crawl through the eye of the needle as a camel.
Themes:
The rich young ruler, camel through the eye of the needle
Messy Church program:
188. The treasure chest - the Rich Young Ruler
189. Make your own rules? - the Rich Young Ruler
190. Jesus turns everything upside down - the Rich Young Ruler
191. Give something away! - the Rich Young Ruler
192. Shuffleboard with money! - the Rich Young Ruler
193. The camel race - The Rich Young Ruler
194. Crawling through the eye of a needle - The Rich Young Ruler
195. Pimp your own camel - The Rich Young Ruler
196. Looking through Jesus' eyes at the world - The Rich Young Ruler
197. Praying with a needle and a thread - The Rich Young Ruler