What a wonderful world



What a wonderful world

Gathering

Leader: We gather together in Jesus' Name

All: Help us explore, discover and learn together

Engaging

As you came to school this morning, what did you see? Or hear? Or smell? Did you notice anything at all?

When you arrive in India, the first things that hits you are the smells and the sights and the noise. Everything seems much bigger and brighter and noisier, and even smellier than here.

If you are a visitor, and being met by friends, they will probably meet you at the airport. They're not allowed into the building, so as you walk out of the airport, first of all you're met by a sea of people who've all come to meet their family and friends. It seems as if everyone who ever knew the travellers who've got off the planes have come to meet them! And they all seem to be talking and making a tremendous noise. At first you think 'I've never seen so many people - where will my friends be?' But suddenly you notice waving arms - and a whole crowd of people has usually turned up to meet you as well!

This crowd will probably be carrying a garland of flowers - to go round your neck. It will usually be made of rose petals and jasmine, and be bright yellow and pink or white. Because there are so many flowers in the garland, the perfume of the flowers is amazing. Somehow the flowers seem to have more scent than here.

Then jostling for attention in your nostrils will be the smell of street vendors cooking - bhajis and pakoras, curries - even the tea is sometimes cooked with spices in it, and the smell of the spices seems to be everywhere.

But don't get too taken up with the scents, because you also notice all the colours as well - not just the colours of the flowers, but the colours of people's clothes, particularly the ladies' saris; the colour that the lorries are painted; the colours of the kolams to say 'welcome', the colours of the pictures in the houses.

And there's so much to look at - cows and donkeys wandering along the middle of the street; a lake full of lotus flowers; the small shops which open up directly onto the street and sell absolutely everything you can imagine; the paddy fields green with young rice; and people everywhere; ladies on motor scooters, balancing children, shopping and their saris.

Then you notice the noise - there's music everywhere - everyone seems to be playing some kind of music. If you're travelling in a car or bus or minibus, the driver will have his hand on the horn all the time. Maybe you'll be really lucky and be held up by a street procession, when the local band will be leading a group of people, perhaps a wedding or birthday party, a special occasion, even a funeral. The band will be playing a collection of instruments, some of which you will never have seen before, but they will be the same instruments that have been played for generations.

And at certain times the temple or the mosque will call people to prayer - sometimes even the Christian churches join in the noise - because temples, mosques and churches all have loudspeakers on the outside of their buildings for others to hear.

The birds and the insects add their own sounds to the dawn, dusk and night.

The sights and the sounds and the smells can make you very tired and you're ready to crash into bed, but when you think it's time to be fast asleep, the 5.00 am siren sounds to wake people up for their day's work for people don't all have alarm clocks like us!

And once you're very tired, you begin to notice the other things as well - the things that aren't favourite sights or smells or sounds at all.

 

• The noise of the cars, the music, even the birds, sometimes never seems to stop, and leaves you exhausted

• You see the poor little shacks that so many people live in - nothing more than a palm leaves woven together, to form a very inadequate shelter from the cold or the rains. You hear the cries of the people who have to beg to get enough to eat for the day.

• You see the piles of rubbish, just left to rot at the side of the street, with the goats and the cows rummaging through it, hoping for some food. You can smell it as well. Sometimes there might be a smelly sewer or drain nearby, which overpowers all the nicer smells.

• You might see a dry river bed, because the rains did not come.

India is a very beautiful country where everything seems so much larger than life - the sights and the smells and the sounds.

But because everything seems so much larger, we can also see how we have all misused God's creation. We have so much while some people have very little, and have to beg. Not just in India, but everywhere, we throw our rubbish away without thinking of the environment. We know that we want to listen to our music, or our noise, but we don't worry about other people.

The Bible says that when God made the world, he saw that it was very good. As we look at India, we can see that God's world is very good, and wonderful. But it also reminds us that he told us to care for his creation, and for one another - and too often we forget to do that.

(Check it out: Genesis chp 1 vss 26-31)

Responding

Can you think of one thing you can do to care for God's world, and God's people? Is there something we can do as a school?

Prayer

Thank God for his wonderful world - maybe mentioning some of the favourite scents and sights and sounds, pray for ways that we can help to keep it wonderful.

Sending

Leader: Go in peace to discover God's world and your place in it

All: We go in Jesus' name

................
................

In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.

Google Online Preview   Download