SOLD

This time last year, we were still in a barn, painting and scheming and trying to square up an exhibit that seemed to refuse to be square.

Now, we have a trailer and an experience that has made it to California and back with another California trip on the way. We've had three showings in town and two within a few hours drive. Hundreds and hundreds of people have gone through and come out the other side without anything falling on their heads.

It still seems to be standing up, and, about the time that we thought that we were going to be through with it, it still seems to be picking up steam, gaining a life of its own despite our lack of any grand canvasing efforts.

Being the type that is prone to "believing six impossible things before breakfast," it all seems very simple in my head. We set out to build an exhibit, so, of course the end result was an exhibit.

What doesn't tend to stay so well is the reality of the sheer number of hours that have been poured into this exhibit. As if too many growing up years of Shoeboxes and Nutcracker have normalized the pouring of every waking moment into a project in brief spurts of intensity, this too seems like just another thing to do.

Of course, it isn't.

Not all families sit around the dinner table and discuss procurement, budgeting, and scheduling for a traveling anti-trafficking experience. Not all trips to the store include cap guns to make South Sudan smell like gunpowder or apple spray for Washington.

Not all families build their schedules around set-up and tear-down dates. But, in this part of the desert, at least four families do.

We pass things back and forth between showings as if we were passing off a baby. "Make sure you..." "Don't forget to..." "Be careful about..."

Because, there are quirks, little things that each person knows, about the way that the trailer hauls, or the walls go up, or the curtains drape, and we all fight the feeling that no one else will do it quite right - even if we aren't sure what "right" is ourselves.

But, it always comes out right in the end.

Even when soap is late or the router doesn't work or the eighty-eight year old woman can't figure out where her audio is coming from. Even when we don't think that we have the volunteers that we need or  the trailer gets scratched or stacks of lumber slip sideways. Eventually, things come together.

Just like we have audio now, even though it seemed, a year ago, like it would never be finished. Just like the walls were eventually painted and we finally figured out how to make the scents strong enough to mask the smell of gym. Just like the t-shirts did come and the website does have everything that we need.

If we'd gotten it all right the first time, there would have been no adventure.

Strange

It is strange sometimes, being somewhere I never thought that I would be. I never thought that I would be living here for so long, never planned on letting the desert once again become home. It is strange to be surrounded by the faces of kids who I thought that I said goodbye to five and a half years ago, when I first left for college. 

It is strange to remember that, ultimately, I am not the one in control. 

Because, I would leave tomorrow if I could, that wanderlust in my belly never satisfied with being still for long. Always, a new month rolls along and something in my mind whispers that this could be it, that this could be the time that I leave. 

Always, there is the part that wants to be doing something bigger, grander, the part that is never satisfied with the small and the gradual and the steady work of building years of trust. There is the nomad's instinct to move and to move on, leaving a piece of my heart with no intention of ever going back to collect it.

There are the plans built on clouds and old prophesy, scraps of paper and hours of internet searches. There is the knowledge building up, waiting.

And yet, He has a better way. 

So, it is strange, but it is also beautiful.

It is beautiful when I can stand in the resource room, preparing for elementary Sunday school and talking with middle schoolers, while a high schooler tugs on my arm and reminds me of the application that we have to finish filling out. The one so that we can go back to work at a camp for foster kids where I was first her counselor. 

When a sixth grader sneaks up to poke me in the sides during game or bump into me during worship, much as he did as a kindergartener and fourth and fifth grader, and when I take an eighth grader's hand to spin around during music.

When we sit on the floor to listen to a speaker and they are curled in so tight that their feet are over mine and under my legs and folded knees are against my hip without thinking. When they reach my shoulder now, rather than my elbow, all lanky little boy and blushing shyness. When they still find me before they do anything else. 

When I teach Sunday school with seniors whose kindergarten class I once volunteered in and talk about Haiti with a sixteen year old, knowing that I was a flower girl in his parents' wedding. When my school kids are at church and my church kids are at school. 

When my discontent is silenced by His quiet whisper that I will move on when it is time and not a moment sooner. When I can trust that His way is better. 

Then it is strange, and it is beautiful.

Haiti Again

It's that time of year again. As if Haiti were a season, rolling around every so many months with the steadiness of coming spring, summer, fall, or winter. Rainy season, windy season, Haiti season. 

It has become part of the rhythm of the youth group, just like the other Haiti trips have become a part of the rhythm of the larger body. 

For weeks now, the kids have been asking about applications. For months, they have had the tentative dates scheduled into their calendars. Since we got back, they have been talking about "next time." It's deep in their blood, this leaving and coming back and letting the heart take up residence somewhere far from the body. 

We stand around fires, with the February wind still biting at our backs, and they ask if they did well last year, if they did everything that they could have done. Names fall from their lips like talismans. We sit in the dark, watching half a dozen photos flash by on the screen, and I can feel their excitement, as if their bags were already packed and their passports in hand. 

It's that time of year. 

Just after Haiti has started to fade, started to cease being the answer to every question asked, February rolls around again, and it once again becomes that thing that slips into every conversation.  It's Haiti season. 

For the next four and a half months, we will pray and plan and fundraise and talk until it seems like we must have surely squeezed all of the life out of the trip. Along the way, the team will mold and change, and, somehow, everyone will always know who is going and who is not. 

Because this is important to them, these nine days that have the power to shape their year. 

They'll talk about the hard parts and the beautiful parts, and the two will overlap into a vague sort of sense of what happens next, a pulsing anticipation as they try to sort out what they know is coming. And, it will be good. 

It will be a mess, and they will be a mess, and they will wonder at times why they ever thought that this would be a grand adventure. We'll question the moment that we ever thought we knew what we were doing, taking these kids to Haiti. 

But, in the end, it will be good. As if Haiti were a season, wild and untamed in its predicability, another cycle in this rhythm that is desert life. 

Story Tellers: God's Story

Ever since Eve and Adam in the Garden, God's people have been trying to let the whole world see how good and how big God is. They have not always been perfect story tellers, but God has always had a plan to keep the story moving.

We read last week about how the very best tellers of God's story have always been the people who trusted the Holy Spirit to help them be brave and patient and take care of others. The very best story tellers were also some of the very best pray-ers.

This week, I want to tell you about three men who trusted the Holy Sprit. They trusted God to help them tell his story, and God helped them to each tell His story in a way that changed how all of God's people thought about story telling. Just like Peter who we read about in the Bible!

The first man was named William Carey.

He lived about two hundred years ago in a country called England. William Carey didn't have a very fancy job. He fixed other people's broken shoes. But, he had a very clever mind, and he spent a lot of time learning new languages and thinking about God things.

One of the God things that he thought about a lot was the part in the Bible where Jesus told His followers to “Go and make disciples.” You see, when William Carey was growing up, most people had forgotten about that part.

They were so busy talking about God's story with each other that most people had forgotten that they were still supposed to go and tell His story to people and places that had never heard it before.

Kind of crazy, huh? They were so busy talking about God's story that they forgot to actually go out and be a part of God's story. They forgot to do their job...

Download a PDF of the entire story here or click on the activity pages below to download.

Growing: God's Story

So far, our story about how God wants to be known by every single person on the planet has all come out of the Bible. And, that's a good thing. It's hard to start a story about God if you don't start with the things that God says about God.

When a guy named John wrote the very last word of the very last page of what turned out to be the very last book of the Bible, though, God's story wasn't over.

It kept going.

And, it kept going. And, it kept going. And, it kept going.

Because, Jesus' followers kept going. They kept moving into new places and meeting new people, and, everywhere that they went, they brought God's story with them.

Sometimes, they did a good job of bringing God's story, like when they were patient and brave and remembered to pray and to take care of each other and other people. When they let the Holy Spirit be their helper, they made wise choices and people understood about God. People understood that God was big and that God was good and that God wanted to be known by every single person on the planet.

Sometimes, lots of people understood all at once, and we started calling times like those 'revivals.' Revival is just a fancy church word that means that lots of people are understanding the same sorts of things about God all at the same time, like what happened when the Holy Spirit first came and three thousand new people decided to follow Jesus...

Download a PDF of the entire story here and click on the activity pages below to download.

Snow Blast

 

Camp is one of those strange times where no one ever quite knows what we're walking into - even if we think that we might have a pretty good idea. Middle school winter retreat was no exception to the rule. 

"What do you mean by that?" one of the high school leaders questions me. We're tagging bags to go under the bus, and I've just mentioned that he has "my boys" in his cabin and he had better be good to them. 

"I was their Sunday school teacher." We weave our way through bodies as he clarifies exactly which kids I am talking about, and we both know that, largely, the warning ought to be unnecessary. 

These were my boys, yes. But, it has been months since they needed to sit next to me at Ignite or have more interaction than what it takes to play gaga ball or tag. They have other leaders now. But, their other leaders aren't here, and so I warn him, just in case. 

Because, yes, I am just a wee bit protective. 

And, because I don't want him think it odd when we get on the bus and they start trying to find a seat for me next to where they are. Because, they will, and they do, as if we only got off the bus from summer camp yesterday and they're ready to simply pick back up where we left off. 

My bag ends up in a seat halfway between them and my girls, and the four hour ride ends up split, split between making bracelets in the back and making bracelets in the front, split between snacks in the back and snacks in the front, split between admiring rubber chickens and finger lights in the back and fart putty in the front. 

Eventually, I settle into the front, and the boys give up on traversing the length of the bus, back and forth, in and out of arm's reach, just to make sure that they are not forgotten. We talk about camp and Sunday school and asking girls to dances. They dump the fart putty on my head and then apologize and pick it out carefully when they realize that it's stuck to my hair. 

They talk about girls from school and who likes who - all with a kaleidoscope stuck to their eye, still more distracted by the colors and shapes than by the thought of girls. 

Someone steals a notebook from someone else, and the only response is a, "Jessica!" as if it is somehow my job to get it back. I do, just like I wrap their wrists in bracelets that I've made and bracelets they've made themselves, and, by the time that we pull into camp, they check in one last time and run off to find their cabin. 

And, I don't know what their cabin is like, but mine is full of girls and full of memories. Because, we were in this same cabin last summer, with almost this exact same group of girls. They laugh and talk and giggle and half way fill in the new ones on old jokes. We unpack and scarf some spaghetti and head to chapel. 

Three leaders and eight girls means that they have no chance. One of us will be in their face during music, encouraging them to spin and jump and sing and scream, even when they don't think that they can. 

Because, they can. Once they work through the watching and the sizing up and the analyzing, they are loud and silly and prone to throwing things at each other (candy and rubber chickens and anything else they can get their hands on, including - apparently - wads of deodorant). 

Yep, the waking up process one morning, while we were in a leaders' meeting, included throwing scoops of gel deodorant. Don't be fooled by the chapel faces. They aren't as calm as they may appear.

But, it's also okay. It's okay to analyze everything the speaker says. It's okay to not understand all of the questions on the cabin time sheet. And, it's okay for our discussion to only last ten minutes and then devolve into coloring and decorating bandanas.

They're eleven and twelve and right at that age where words are starting to give way to emotions that they don't quite know what to do with. Right at that age where there is so much more going on inside than what we see on the outside. 

So, when they jump in to fend off serious questions with ridiculous answers, we largely just roll our eyes and make an attempt at redirection. And, then, in the morning, we use our cabin time to hike through the snow in search of a "Noah stick" for the talent show, to play Catch Phrase in the dining hall, and to make more bracelets. 

Always more bracelets. 

And, then it's lunch, and it's free time, and they speak this language. 

Because, this is climbing piles of snow and tubing and spending hours sitting in the snow trying to catch video of the most spectacular crashes. This is Jessica pushing one of the boys down the hill on his knees and talking about crashes over and over and over again until they feel like they have personally had the coolest wipe out in the history of all of camp. 

This is snowball fights with the youth pastor and laughter and teasing and time spent simply together.

By the end of free time, the hill has been abandoned by most everyone else, and we have free reign, my girls and my boys and few extras that we picked up from other churches along the way. And, they would stay here forever if they could. They've been missing this. 

They've missed being able to fall into old rhythms without having to be cool in a room full of a hundred other watching eyes, missed feeling like what we did revolved around them specifically. They've missed being "Jessica's kids" or "Rich's kids" or "Deanne's kids," missed belonging somewhere in specific, missed having the freedom to choose their own small group. 

And, they're eating this up. 

To these kids, raised on a diet of donut fights and tree climbing and hiding out in bushes and behind chairs, hours of half frozen tubing is just as much church as anything that might happen in chapel or cabin time. Church is wherever they talk about Jesus and feel loved. 

After hours of smacking their heads around on a tubing run, dodgeball in a blacked out gym, with strobe lights and glow sticks and projectiles that connect with your face before they show up in the dark...not so much how they feel loved. 

We end up being that church, the one that pulls a quarter of their kids out of the game and lets them wait outside rather than continue to participate. (Cardinal camp rule being that everyone participates, always.)

But, we're okay with breaking the rule this time. Because, these are our kids with trauma backgrounds and migraines, anxiety and general I-flew-off-my-tube-and-landed-on-my-head-in-the-snow/ice headaches, and they need the chance to practice saying 'no' to things that aren't good for them. Why not practice now, when there are leaders here to back them up?

They can practice saying 'no,' and we can practice saying 'yes.'

Yes, we can go back up to the tubing hill until it's time for dinner. Yes, you can use the camera to record. Yes, I saw you. Yes, you can use my phone to take a picture of the river. Yes, you can give me beard for the talent show. Yes, I will watch you and tell you that you were awesome. Yes, I will teach you how to make a bracelet. Yes, you can borrow some gloves. Yes, I am right here. Yes, I am staying. 

Yes, you can use my markers. Yes, you can sit by me during chapel. Yes, you can have my brownie. Yes, I will watch and make sure you start feeling better. Yes, you can borrow my pillow for the weekend. Yes, you can read off of my notes. Yes, I will work on your bracelet. Yes, I did see your awesome crash. Yes, you can watch the video again. Yes, you can decorate my journal. Yes, I will put it on Facebook. 

Yes, you can. 

Yes, I will.

 And, eventually, they say 'yes' too. They say 'yes' to whatever they hear God asking from them this weekend, and they say 'yes' to trying to make it real, even after we get home. 

Because, after a very long bus ride, we do make it home. 

Sunday morning, we pack and vacate the cabin, eat breakfast, and sit down for one final chapel. The girls are packed in tightly on my left, listening and watching and analyzing as always. They're tired and sore. They've decorated a pair of jeans and eaten more sugar and carbs than they ought to have needed in a month. 

When we ask them for a number, they rate the weekend as a 5 on a scale from one to ten. 

The boys are packed in on my right, as tightly as they can fit. They're tired and they're sore and they tell me they 'don't feel so good.' They're drinking Orange Crush on top of the pancakes and syrup that I hope their counselors made them eat for breakfast, and their pockets are packed full of candy. 

When I ask for a better or worse than summer camp, they give me a hesitant 'better.' 

"Shorter at least?" I qualify, and they nod. 

Chapel passes. We sing one last song, wait in the cabin a few minutes, and load the girls onto the bus. The boys are riding home in a separate van, and they edge closer to me, declaring that they are going to sneak in and hide behind a seat. I laugh and sass back at them, and they remember to smile a little, to pretend like they are joking.

And, eventually, we make it home. 

We're barely breaking even between the good and the bad, the fun and the painful, the moments when they want to be at camp forever and the moments when decisions are being made for them that they hate. 

Even is a whole lot better than where we stood at the end of the week this summer, but I'm not the only overprotective leader here, and even isn't good enough for any of us. Not when we're talking about our kids. I'm not sure how, but we're going to figure out how to make this better. 

If we're asking the kids to come, we owe them that much. 

Helper: God's Story

Last week, when we finished our story, Jesus had just given eleven of His followers a very important job. They were supposed to tell the whole world about how big and how good God is.

It seemed like too big of a job for such a small group of people, and, right after He gave the instructions, Jesus went back up to heaven. He wasn't living on earth anymore to show and tell people how big and how good God is. Now, the disciples had to do it. But, do you know what they did instead?

They waited.

Instead of going out and telling the world, they got together with about 150 of Jesus' followers, and waited, just like Jesus had told them to do. They didn't know quite what they were waiting for, but they knew that Jesus had told them to wait in Jerusalem. If they are going to tell the world, or even their neighbors, anything, they are going to need some help. So, God does something really cool. Listen to this.

When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them...Then Peter stood up with the Eleven, raised his voice and addressed the crowd: “Fellow Jews and all of you who live in Jerusalem, let me explain this to you; listen carefully to what I say...Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day. (Acts 1:1-4,14,41)

God does just what He promised. He sends them the Holy Spirit to help them do their job, just like He gave His breath to Adam and Eve to help them do their job. And, it works. In one day, one hundred fifty people become three thousand one hundred fifty people. It starts to look like, maybe, with the Holy Spirit, things are starting to get easy.

And, the Holy Spirit does help them. But, that doesn't make things easy...

Download a PDF of the entire story here and click on the activity pages below to download. 

Habits

(Third grader teaching me how to make a trick paper airplane)

Every few weeks, the kids at the elementary school I work at manage to come up with new habits. It might be that every other kid on the primary playground wants to show me their cartwheel or bridge for days on end. It might be that they want to play tag, that they want to see how loudly they can yell, that they want to hang on the monkey bars the longest or have me watch while they play chicken. 

I've gone through weeks of playing tetherball - which I am terrible at - listening to songs, watching dances, or having the same children on each arm day in and day out. 

Two weeks ago, the boys (Kinder all the way through 5th) seemed to be testing a theory that, if you ran up to give Ms. Jessica a hug directly before/after doing something forbidden, you wouldn't get in trouble. 

Sorry; doesn't work. 

They gave that one up after about three days. 

The newest trick seems to involve presenting me with anyone who has had a chance to move back to school. And, yes, I do mean presenting, the way that you would present someone with a trophy or an award or perhaps a new puppy. 

Today, I was pounced/hugged by a third grade boy who had drug over two girls purely to make sure that I knew that one of them was back from Mexico. After he had made the announcement, he sent them away with that regal tone that only a nine-year-old could be sassy enough and bold enough to quite pull off. 

Mainly it made me smile because of how much it echoed a situation with the older kids. 

I am only on the 4th/5th playground every other Wednesday and Thursday, but the kids almost always seem to know when to look for me. (That they keep track of it when I can barely do so, is more than a little impressive.)

Two Wednesdays ago, I walked around the corner at the beginning of recess to find a tight knot of fourth graders up against the wall. Typically, not a good sign. No crush of bodies running over to give me a hug or tell me a story all at the same time, which is also very not normal for this class of kids who always seem to be trying to fit two weeks worth of everything into a single recess. 

"Ms. Jessica!" One of the girls waved me over with that tone of voice that is reserved for situations in which she thinks that I need to intervene right now. 

Oh, joy. Thirty seconds into recess is not a promising start to the day.

And, then, goofy grins all around, they part the circle to reveal a kid who moved out of town early this fall. They had been hiding him until I got close enough that it would have been impossible to miss his presence. 

"Are you happy," one of the girls asks me, eyes as bright as if they had just offered me a perfect Christmas gift, "that _____ is back?"

Yes. Always. And, the fact that you all worked together to make it a surprise is pretty stinking adorable. My kids are sweet. Sometimes. 

Three minutes later, they were pulling him to the ground and getting themselves in trouble for being generally cruel - in the way that only children can be when they are trying to establish a new/old pecking order. 

Sometimes, not so sweet. 

They're working on it. Some habits, like self control and kindness and responsibility are harder to build than others, and better at it doesn't always mean good at it. (If I got paid for every time one of those three virtues came out of my mouth when talking to kids, I could be quite well off.)

"Can you choose to be responsible?"

"Self control with your body."

"Kind words with your mouth."

"Thank you for doing that. That was very kind/responsible."

"Can you keep control of your mouth?"

"Thank you. Making responsible choices is how you grow up to be a good man/woman." 

One of the second graders recently asked me, while bent over to help a friend clean up a mess (the responsible choice), "I'm growing up, aren't I?"

Yes, kiddo. Yes, you are. There's a long ways to go still, but plenty of time to get there. And, so far, I'm pretty stinking proud of you, 

When Playing Counts

"You're getting in!" One of my sixth graders looks around the room just long enough to realize that I don't have to be in a leaders' meeting. Not yet anyways. 

It's habit by now, this trying to get me into the octagon first thing, before the pit is swarming with bodies ready to play gaga ball, when there's just a few of them starting things off. Most weeks, it doesn't work. Most weeks I send him to play with a few friends instead, while I go to a meeting. 

This week, it works. 

My shoes come off, and he grins one of those little boy smiles that have half of the youth leaders in love with him. He's growing up, just a little bit, and, at twelve I no longer get every last story of his week the way that I did when he was ten. Instead, this kid who I have taught since kindergarten revels in the ability to beat me at a game. 

I'm getting better at it, still not good, but better than the hopeless mess of the first few weeks months, and his face furrows in concentration. He's growing, and it's a hard balance, trying to keep enough control of his body to get me out without striking too hard and sending the ball flying over the edge of the octagon (automatic out to the last person to touch it). 

When he succeeds - because, oh are they ever working together to aim directly for me - it's the first time in weeks that he's been the one to hit me, and his eyes nearly explode with it. 

"I love this game!!"

***

"We want to go with you." My three shadows follow me and my microphone through the fellowship hall. I'm explaining the game, and everyone else is joining a team, but they won't, not yet. Not until I put the microphone down and come with them. 

Most weeks we split games by grade and gender. Most weeks they don't get to choose their leader. This week, they aren't about to let the opportunity slip. (Which, partially, is why I chose this game in the first place.)

We join a group, and sixth grade eyes turn my direction without thinking twice. It's an old habit that is harder than I ever thought it would be to break. Not that I mind. They have other leaders now. The boys have men who are willing and ready to pour into them every week, to put the squirrelly ones into holds during music and teach them to whistle with two fingers. 

But, in moments like this, when we're running and when they're poking their fingers out the front of their shirt to be a cow (charades), their eyes light up with the thrill of doing something well, and I catch it in their faces. They like this part of growing up. 

Because, right now, during this ridiculous game, when things are just enough new and just enough the way that they have always been, they feel in control. 

They don't lose, but they don't win either. And, it doesn't matter, because they have 7,000,010 points, with the ten points being perhaps the most important of all. Those ten points mean that they were listening when I gave the instructions. Those ten points mean that they are old enough to laugh about the rules, rather than just break them without understanding. Those ten points are another layer to years worth of memories that mean church and joy and safety and adults who love them and who love Jesus. 

They could care less about the seven million, so long as I remember the ten. 

***

"None of these fit."One of my calmest, sweetest cluster girls laughs quietly about her Apples to Apples cards while we wait for the power to come back on for the Super Bowl. There's a longstanding tradition that the cards you win describe who you are. Her first card is "Loud," followed by "Cold" and "Animated." 

We text a picture to the leader who isn't there and let her join in on the moment. 

It isn't anything massive, but it is rather rare. Slowing down like this, just playing games, only happens a couple of times a year. Maybe because of that, few people really seem to care about the football game when it come back on, or even about playing this game the way that it is supposed to go. We just chose cards for an hour and a half, people coming in and out whenever they please. This game is only an excuse, like every other game today. 

It's a way to connect, a type of communication that doesn't require stories or even many words. It's a way to prove, at least a little, that we're all on the same page, that we understand each other. 

The game lasts until nearly 8:00pm, and this ends up being youth group, this sitting on the floor, crammed together to play with words and cards and careful irony. 

For this week, just playing counts. 

***

"The body heals with play; the mind heals with laughter, and the spirit heals with joy."

Job: God's Story

Last week, we read a really long story about all sorts of God things. We read about how Jesus lived, and we read about some of the things that Jesus taught, like the story that He told His disciples about the wheat and the weeds.

 This week, our story is going to be a lot shorter. 

 Actually, I only want to read a couple of verses to you today. I'll bet that you've heard them before, and I'll bet that you already know a lot about them. They come from the book of Matthew, in the New Testament, the very end of the book of Matthew. Jesus has already lived and died and risen from the dead, and now He has one last thing to tell His followers before He goes back to heaven. 

  Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” Matthew 28:18-20 

 Have you heard those verses before? Do you know any of them by heart? Let's hear it. 

 Nice work. Those are some pretty important verses to know. Jesus tells His followers some things that He's told them lots of times before. But, this last time, He smooshes it all together, like He wants to make sure that they don't have any excuse for forgetting it... 

 Download a PDF of the entire story here and click on the activity pages below to download.