Before class
Scissors first: about fifteen short strips of colored paper, each a different shade, and one long strip of a single color, with tape to hang them. When you read pp. 58–62 the evening before, you will see that the table and the cycle on p. 59 are your best help in class. Mark Joshua 24:14–24, Judges 2:11–19, Ruth 1:16 and 1 Samuel 8:4–7. Print the Big-Print Stretch for Section 8, or keep the book open on a table.
Opening · 5 minutes
Tape the colored strips to the wall one after another, without explaining, until you have a ragged row of colors. Then step back. “Israel has just walked into the promised land. They have no king, and they have promised God that he alone will rule them. Each of these colors is a man or a woman God sent to rescue them, because they kept forgetting that promise.” Tape the long strip at the end. “And this is what happened when they asked for a king like everybody else. Tonight we are going to read the whole row on Adams’ chart, one color at a time.”
At the chart · 15 minutes
1Into the land. Start at the top left of pp. 60–61 with the words “In 40 y’rs. enter Canaan, 1451 B.C.” (pin 1, p. 60), and let the class find Joshua’s heading below them. Then show them the word THEOCRACY in its frame and read Adams’ note: the people chose the Lord as their king by a solemn vote (pin 2). Read Joshua 24:22 aloud. Finish with the city gate and the running man of pin 6, and turn to the map on p. 59 to find the six cities of refuge in gold.
2A row of colors. Now put everyone’s finger on the band and name the key: Key 3 · A new color is a new ruler (pin 3, p. 60). Read the blocks left to right: the Elders, Othniel, Ehud, Shamgar, Deborah and Barak, Gideon. Show the two rescue pictures, Ehud and King Eglon, and Jael with her hammer (pin 4). Then open the table on p. 59 and ask the class which judges have an oppressor beside them. Read Judges 2:11–19 and let them name the steps of the cycle in their own words.
3Counting the years. Ask a student to read Deborah’s block: it says 47. Then read Judges 5:31, which gives forty. Let the class puzzle before you read the Watch Out box on p. 61: a block shows the span drawn, 1338 to 1291. Widen it to the whole band. Adams’ list adds up to about 500 years, but the band runs from 1409 to 1095, which is 314. Read his own explanation on p. 62, overlapping judges and opposite sides of the Jordan, and point out that he shows his working.
4Ruth’s thread and the first king. Find Ruth in her red dress and Adams’ note, “From Boaz sprang Obed, David, etc.” (pin 8, p. 61). Then drop under the stream and follow the thin line with the class: Salmon, Boaz, Obed, Jesse, David. Ask where they have seen a thin line like this before. Last, find the place where the colored blocks stop and one long band begins, “Saul, 40. First King” (pin 9). Read 1 Samuel 8:7, and let the class say what the people were really rejecting.
Talk it over · 15 minutes
The people promised at Shechem to serve the LORD. How long does the Theocracy last on Adams’ chart, and why does it end?
Listen for: Listen for 1491 to 1095, which is 396 years, and for the request for a king “like all the nations.” If the class blames Samuel’s sons alone, read 1 Samuel 8:7 again.
Not every block is a full turn of the circle, but the great deliverances are. What does each of those turns say about the people, and what does it say about God?
Listen for: Good answers see both sides of Judges 2: the people keep turning back, and the LORD keeps raising up judges “because of their groanings.” Bring a class that dwells only on the people’s failure back to verse 16.
Ruth was a Moabitess, yet Adams draws her line on to David. What does her place on the chart say about who belongs to God’s people?
Listen for: Listen for Ruth’s own words in 1:16, “thy God my God.” She came in by choosing Israel’s God, and the chart shows her in the line that leads to David.
To close
“… choose you this day whom ye will serve … but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.”Joshua 24:15 · KJV
We choose you again tonight, Lord; keep us from drifting the way Israel did, one generation after another.
With younger children (6–10)
The cities of refuge turn into a game of tag. Mark six safe spots in the room and let the children run to one before you can tag them; then show them the man running to the gate on the chart. Afterwards they count the colored blocks on the band with a finger, and hunt for Jael’s hammer, Gideon’s fleece and bowl, Ruth with her armful of grain, and Samuel kneeling. Samuel’s answer is theirs to say back to you: “Speak, LORD; for thy servant heareth.”