How Has The Christian Message Survived For Over 2000 Years? Christianity
Name of Unit: How Has The Christian Message Survived For Over 2000 Years? / Faith: ChristianityKey Stage in which this unit should be taught: KS 2 / Recommended Year Group (if specified): Upper Key Stage 2
Previous Learning:
Salvation units;
Incarnation units,
Christian Baptism and Marriage; other religious rites of passage.
AT1 Learning About Religion
Focus: Beliefs, teachings and sources. / AT2 Learning From Religion
Focus: Meaning, purpose and truth.
What This Unit Teaches:
How the Christian message spread in the past;
The Ascension;
What persecution is and why it might inhibit the spread of a message;
Pentecost;
How the Christian Message spread after Jesus’ Ascension and the first Pentecost;
What Pentecost shows about The Trinity;
How Confirmation contributes to the spread of the Christian message;
How Christians believe that the Holy Spirit equips them to share the Christian message and how the confirmation ritual shows this belief.
Key RE Vocabulary:
Christianity, Christian, faith, message, Acts, New Testament, Bible, disciples / apostles, Ascension, Gospel, belief, persecution, refugee, asylum seeker, Icthus, Pentecost, Holy Spirit, “Fruits of the Spirit,” Galatians, Trinity, Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Grace, cross, Creator, Incarnation, Salvation, baptise, symbol, symbolism, stole, blessing, Admitted To Communion, Confirmation, confirm, rite of passage, oil, anoint, candle, Confirmation certificate, Confirmation card, promise, Holy Communion, Eucharist, denomination. / Cross-Curricular Links:
Literacy; Numeracy; Computing; Art and Design; Design and Technology; Geography; Music; PE; Personal, Social and Health Education; Citizenship.
British Values.
Spiritual, Moral, Social and Cultural Development:
Spiritual: - Writing a message to the world, opportunities for reflection, writing Confirmation promises;
Moral: - Persecution and its effects;
Social: - Collaborative working, understanding British values;
Cultural: - Christians around the world, persecution because of cultural / race beliefs. / Sensitivities:
Pupils and / or their families who are refugees or asylum seekers or may have experienced or know someone who has experienced persecution;
Respectful handling of artefacts.
‘The Great Commission’ video is for discussion as part of this RE unit and is not being used as part of Collective Worship.
Possible Further Thinking and Extension Activities:
Persecution in our society and our country – against different individuals and groups of people, in its different forms;
Exploration of the similarities and differences between different Christian denominations;
Linking confirmation to Bar and Bat Mitzvah and with other rites of passage in other faiths;
Link with the Jewish festival of Shavuot.
Future Learning:
Possibly: - Salvation Unit(s) that have not yet been taught, (depending on where this unit is placed in the school’s RE Curriculum Map)
- Incarnation Unit(s) that have not yet been taught, (depending on where this unit is placed in the school’s RE Curriculum Map)
Who Decides? (Bridging / Transition Unit)
Learning Objectives / AT1 / AT2 / Suggested Teaching Activities / Points To Note /
Lesson 1
Pupils should:
Understand the events of Jesus’ Ascension and how believers were tasked with spreading the message of God;
(AT1)
Be aware of the necessary ingredients for a purposeful message that conveys meaning.
(AT2) / ü
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Introduction:
Ask the pupils to think of ‘a message’ that they have heard today.
Encourage the pupils to think broadly about messages, what a message is and the different ways in which we hear messages each and every day.
What was a message that the pupils have heard today?
Discuss:
How did they hear / see / read it? Did they have to go somewhere to receive it or did it come to them? Where were they? Who was it from? Who gave the message? Was the person that gave the message the originator of the message or were they passing it on from someone else? Was the message intended for them to receive or for someone else?
What kind of message was it? e.g. the genre / the tone of it? What difference has it made to them that they have heard the message? Do they plan to spread the message any further? Why? / Why not?
How important are messages? Why?
Main Part of the Lesson:
Give background Biblical information about Jesus’ Ascension. Useful background information on Re:quest website. Read or tell the pupils the story of Jesus’ Ascension. Make sure that they are aware that it comes from The Book of Acts in The New Testament of The Bible, Acts being the “acts” of the apostles. Acts 1:6-11.
Explain that Jesus’ Ascension was not the end of his influence on Earth, but part of His legacy was to task His apostles with the responsibility of continuing His work here.
After this and the first Pentecost, which we are going to learn about later in this unit, (but hopefully the pupils will know something already about it from being in a Church school,) the disciples began to spread the “Good News” of Jesus’ death and resurrection and the message of God.
Watch / read the story of Philip and the Ethiopian. Acts 8: 26-39.
Display an image of the Ethiopian man.
Discuss (and select areas to record as appropriate)
Why did this message convince him to become a Christian? What right ingredients did this message have for it to work? What made this message so special?
What would have been the difficulties of spreading the message in Biblical times? Wonder at how the message has been spread, despite the difficulties.
Establish the ‘ingredients’ for a message that will spread (e.g. important, clear, people / another means to explain it, people to understand and accept it.)
Explain that these ingredients must work as a cycle or the message will stop being spread.
Plenary Activity:
Ask the children to imagine that they have an important message to pass on to as many people as possible. Give each pair / group a gold envelope to represent the message.
How would they have spread the message in Biblical times?
How would they spread the message now, in the present day?
Individually, pupils to think about what message they would want to spread around the world?
Have some triangles of material cut out like bunting pieces.
Each pupil to write their message for the world on their piece of material.
These can then be tied onto a line across the classroom or in the school grounds for the message to be carried by the wind across the world.
(The messages could also be put into a gallery on the school’s website to spread the messages across the world wide web!) / In the Bible, Jesus was crucified, died, rose from the dead three days later and then ascended into Heaven.
Following Jesus’ Ascension, the Holy Spirit came through wind, a dove and tongues of fire and was poured upon Jesus’ followers. This was the first Pentecost and the birth of the Christian Church.
In the book of Acts (of the Apostles) in The Bible, we read how the followers of Jesus began to spread the “Good News” (gospel) after receiving the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.
Some disciples, such as Peter, also spread the gospel before Pentecost.
Resources:
The Bible,
Video clip of the story of Philip and the Ethiopian;
Gold envelopes;
Triangles of material cut out like bunting pieces;
Fabric pens;
Ribbon to tie material triangles on;
Reflective music.
Learning Objectives / AT1 / AT2 / Suggested Teaching Activities / Points To Note /
Lesson 2
Pupils should:
Be aware of how the strength of the Christian message and the perseverance of Paul enabled it to survive;
(AT1)
Understand how strength of belief can overcome persecution. (AT2) / ü
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and How Might That Stop Be Overcome?
Introduction:
Ask the pupils to think about the following question:
' What feelings or beliefs are important to you?
Discuss.
Main Part of The Lesson:
Move onto discussing these questions with the class: -
' What feelings or beliefs are important to your family?
' What feelings or beliefs are important to your friends?
' What beliefs are important to the school?
' Does everyone have to believe the same or are people allowed to make their own minds up and have their own beliefs: -
Ø in their family?
Ø in their class?
Ø in the school?
Ø in the country?
' Is it important that people are allowed to hold their own beliefs of what is important to them?
' Why?
(Links can be made here with British Values)
Link to previous learning by introducing Paul, (see Points To Note) as one man who spread the Christian message.
Explain that we know about Paul spreading the message by reading about him in Acts in The New Testament of The Bible.
Show a map of Paul’s travels to tell others the “Good News.” Show video clip or read / tell story of Paul in prison. Why was Paul in prison?
Introduce the word ‘persecution’ and define. Are people persecuted today? Where, when and why are people persecuted today?
Give examples of some people today who are being persecuted, e.g. from the Amnesty International website.
Talk about refugees and asylum seekers.
Show appropriate video clip(s) about refugees / asylum seekers who have been persecuted because of their faith and message.
Record class thoughts.
Discuss how the early Christians were persecuted and, at that time, Christians had to often meet secretly and share their faith quietly.
Tell pupils about the Icthus sign, the sign of the fish made up of the Greek letters that spelt “Jesus Christ, Son of God.”
The Early Christians would draw the sign in the sand if they met someone else whom they thought was a Christian as well and if that person was, they would draw a dot in the fish sign as an eye. These were secret signs to each other that they were Christians and shared the Christian faith.
Activities:
Often people who are persecuted and who have to leave their home quickly, e.g. refugees, have few possessions, with them, indeed some have none at all.
Ask the pupils to think about the Christian faith and the message of Jesus that is at the heart of the Christian faith.
Their task is to design an object that the persecuted Christian could carry around with them that is symbolic of the Christian message.
Think what the purpose of this object could be to the Christian in helping the Christian message continue to survive.
or
Pupils match up cards featuring names of people who have been / are being persecuted for their beliefs (religious and political) around the world.
Discuss answers to the match-up activity and display images of the people involved.
Plenary and Reflection:
What might inhibit a message being spread?
What effect might persecution have on the spread of a message? Why?
What helps you if and when you are challenged on beliefs that you might hold?
I wonder . . . how and why messages spread in places of persecution.
When Christianity began, the early Christians were persecuted for their faith.
How and why has the Christian message that they stood up for survived . . for over 2,000 years? / Saul was a Jew who persecuted Christians until he heard the voice of Jesus on the road to Damascus. (Acts 9) He became a follower of Jesus, travelled to many countries to tell others the “Good News” and became known as Paul.
Persecution: hostility, oppression and ill-treatment, especially because of religious, cultural, race or political beliefs.
Resources:
The Bible,
Paul in prison - Acts 16:16-40;
Video clip of Paul in prison;
Map of Paul’s journeys,
(many available on the Internet)
Amnesty International website;
Video clips about refugees / asylum seekers who have been persecuted because of their faith and message;
Image of the Icthus symbol;
Materials for object representing the Christian message;
Cards featuring names of people who have been / are being persecuted for their beliefs, (religious and political) around the world,
cards featuring the belief that they are being persecuted for
and images of the people involved;
Sensitivities:
Please be sensitive towards pupils who may be refugees or asylum seekers, have experienced persecution themselves or have friends or family who have had this experience.
Learning Objectives / AT1 / AT2 / Suggested Teaching Activities / Points To Note /
Lesson 3
Pupils should:
Make links between the events of the first Pentecost and how Christians feel empowered to spread the Christian message;
(AT1)
Consider how I live my life and others live their lives, considering the attributes that we try to live by.
(AT2) / ü
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After Jesus’ Ascension and The First Pentecost?
Introduction:
Recap on the events after Jesus’ death and that Jesus physically left Earth and ascended to Heaven.
Who would spread the Christian message now?
Main Part of the Lesson:
Tell the pupils about Pentecost.
Read them the story of Pentecost from Acts, ensuring that the pupils are aware that it can be found in The book of Acts in The New Testament of The Bible.
Alternatively tell the story, look at paintings / pictures to learn the story or show a video clip.