Survive 5 Day Church Resources Pack

Survive 5 day church resources pack:

Introduction

We believe that all children should be able to survive beyond their fifth birthday. That's why, on Sunday 5th May, or 5/5, World Vision along with our partners, communities and supporters will unite to make a noise about under-five child mortality.

This pack contains everything you need to help raise awareness with your congregation, Bible study group or church youth groupto take action on #Survive5. It includes Sermon resources, Bible study notes, a special Survive 5 Day prayer and newsletter resources. You can use each to help share the issue and take some time to contemplate and pray about the children facing challenges in Surviving 5.

Sermon planning resources

Sermon option 1

This congregational session invites participants to explore what Scripture has to say about caring for those in need, especially children.

These resources offer opportunities to:

» Explore Scripture.

» Personally reflect, share, and pray about injustices in the world.

» Develop a greater understanding of preventable child deaths.

We appreciate that sermon development and delivery varies from church to church. We encourage you to simply integrate these elements into your usual development and delivery method.

Key scripture:

Mark 5:21-43 NIV

Jesus Raises a Dead Girl and Heals a Sick Woman

21 When Jesus had again crossed over by boat to the other side of the lake, a large crowd gathered around him while he was by the lake. 22 Then one of the synagogue leaders, named Jairus, came, and when he saw Jesus, he fell at his feet. 23 He pleaded earnestly with him, “My little daughter is dying. Please come and put your hands on her so that she will be healed and live.” 24 So Jesus went with him.

A large crowd followed and pressed around him. 25 And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years. 26 She had suffered a great deal under the care of many doctors and had spent all she had, yet instead of getting better she grew worse. 27 When she heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, 28 because she thought, “If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed.” 29 Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in her body that she was freed from her suffering.

30 At once Jesus realized that power had gone out from him. He turned around in the crowd and asked, “Who touched my clothes?”

31 “You see the people crowding against you,” his disciples answered, “and yet you can ask, ‘Who touched me?’ ”

32 But Jesus kept looking around to see who had done it. 33 Then the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell at his feet and, trembling with fear, told him the whole truth. 34 He said to her, “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.”

35 While Jesus was still speaking, some people came from the house of Jairus, the synagogue leader. “Your daughter is dead,” they said. “Why bother the teacher anymore?”

36 Overhearing what they said, Jesus told him, “Don’t be afraid; just believe.”

37 He did not let anyone follow him except Peter, James and John the brother of James. 38 When they came to the home of the synagogue leader, Jesus saw a commotion, with people crying and wailing loudly. 39 He went in and said to them, “Why all this commotion and wailing? The child is not dead but asleep.” 40 But they laughed at him.

After he put them all out, he took the child’s father and mother and the disciples who were with him, and went in where the child was. 41 He took her by the hand and said to her, “Talitha koum!” (which means “Little girl, I say to you, get up!”). 42 Immediately the girl stood up and began to walk around (she was twelve years old). At this they were completely astonished. 43 He gave strict orders not to let anyone know about this, and told them to give her something to eat.

Notes

This passage in Mark begins immediately after Jesus returns from casting the demons out of a non-Jewish man and is promptly met by a large crowd. The throng that gathered around him included an official from the local synagogue whose daughter is on the verge of death.

This man, Jairus, falls before Jesus and begs him to come and heal her. As administrative head of the synagogue, Jairus was responsible for the officialness of officialdom, for making sure that synagogue life was played out in an orderly and dignified manner. As one of the most important and well-respected men in the community, it was extraordinary for the locals to see him groveling at the feet of a lowly village prophet.

So what exactly is Jairus doing on his knees in the dust at Jesus’ feet? Why has he left a daughter who is so sick that every breath might be her last? Why doesn’t such a big-wig simply send his assistant to fetch the healer?

The answer is that Jairus’ world has come crashing down around his ears and he does not have any other safety net. Jesus is his only answer. Jairus’ desperation at the imminent death of his daughter propels him into an unexpected act of humility and faith on her behalf. Things are so bad that he can’t trust the job of persuading Jesus to heal his daughter to anybody who might mess it up.

Leaving the sick-bed and begging on his knees, this suave and successful man swallows his pride and places his hope in the only person who can really help him.

Jairus, in worldly terms, is the big man on the block. But he goes in search of Jesus, even though most people were writing off the Son of God as an upstart village boy.

Jairus’ world has crumbled and become unrecognizable. His need prompts him to cast aside his dignity and come as a suppliant. He places his faith in Jesus, not on his status: “Please come and put your hands on her so that she will be healed and live.”

Jairus is a fantastic illustration of what it means to truly trust God. Because of his position among the religious leaders, some of whom openly opposed Jesus and because of his public acknowledgement of Jesus’ authority, this encounter threatens Jairus’ standing within the community. Jairus risks everything for a moment of Jesus’ time.

In the conversation with the woman, Jesus rejects the orthodoxy of Jewish legalism, as he did so many other times during his ministry. Despite her fears of being spiritually unclean, the woman refuses to give up until she has made personal contact with Jesus. So, rather than chastising her for breaking the law, Jesus praises her actions, using the word “daughter” to recognise the relationship of love and responsibility that binds her to him:

“Daughter, your faith has made you whole. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.”

Which is all very well, but the fact of the matter is that Jesus’ healing of this woman slows things down. By the time he gets to Jairus’ house, the daughter is already dead. It seems like Jairus has put his reputation and career on the line for nothing. It seems like he has exposed himself to the scorn of his peers by daring to believe in the wrong man. And this man, this lowly prophet, really doesn’t seem to have merited his faith. It’s too late. Jesus hasn’t taken Jairus’ desperation seriously enough or responded quickly enough!

At this point, Jairus could get angry and reproach Jesus. Or he could send his servants to throw Jesus off the property, so that his family can mourn in peace. Instead, when the foundation of his faith seems about to crumble, he obeys Jesus’ command. “Don’t be afraid; just believe.” He allows Jesus to enter his house and reach out to his child, and as always, his faith is rewarded.

Jesus reveals himself to be the Lord of Life.

Wouldn’t it be great if the authorities and other people in power saw every dying child in the world as their own; wouldn’t it be great if they would beg the Lord as Jairus did for every child’s life? Every day, 19,000 children around the world are dying for reasons that could be prevented with medicine and information that we have. They are dying due to reasons like pneumonia, diarrhoea, malaria, complications during and before birth, and infections suffered by new-born babies.

Oral rehydration salts and zinc can prevent death from diarrhoea; antibiotics can save children suffering from pneumonia; bednets can help prevent malaria; skilled birth attendants can help prevent birth complications. Clean water and good nutrition for children and pregnant women and breastfeeding for the first six months of a child’s life are also needed. Millions fewer children are dying preventable deaths now than 20 years ago, but we all know that even one death is too many. Jesus addresses the woman in this text as “daughter”; wouldn’t the world be a better place if we viewed every person in need, and especially every child in need, as our own?

Prayer

» PRAY FOR OPPORTUNITIES to reach out to those who are desperately seeking Jesus

» PRAY FOR THE FAITH to stand up and believe that change can happen in your own life and in the lives of others

» PRAY FOR CHANGE in the lives of people who are without hope and for change in the situations around the world that seem hopeless

Grant us, Lord God, a vision of our world as only your love can make it:

A world where the vulnerable are protected,

Where the hungry can eat their fill,

Where the oppressed find comfort and rest,

And where the poor have the same chances as the rich

Please give us courage to stand up and work for a better world,

And help us to make it a place where peace is built with justice,

And justice guided by your love

Amen.

Sermon option 1 was adapted from resources created by World Vision United Kingdom

Sermon option 2

This congregational session invites participants to explore what Scripture has to say about challenging unjust systems that keep people from getting healthcare.

These resources offer opportunities to:

» Explore Scripture.

» Personally reflect, share, and pray about injustices in the world.

» Develop a greater understanding of preventable child deaths.

We appreciate that sermon development and delivery varies from church to church. We encourage you to simply integrate these elements into your usual development and delivery method.

Key scripture:

Luke 13:10-17 NIV

Jesus Heals a Crippled Woman on the Sabbath

10 On a Sabbath Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues, 11 and a woman was there who had been crippled by a spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not straighten up at all. 12 When Jesus saw her, he called her forward and said to her, “Woman, you are set free from your infirmity.” 13 Then he put his hands on her, and immediately she straightened up and praised God.

14 Indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, the synagogue leader said to the people, “There are six days for work. So come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath.”

15 The Lord answered him, “You hypocrites! Doesn’t each of you on the Sabbath untie your ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water? 16 Then should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has kept bound for eighteen long years, be set free on the Sabbath day from what bound her?”

17 When he said this, all his opponents were humiliated, but the people were delighted with all the wonderful things he was doing.

Notes

The synagogue ruler is surprisingly cold-hearted and bureaucratic in his response to the miracle of the healing of this woman who had been crippled for 18 years. His focus was on preserving a legal system that had become inflexible and blind to both the true needs of its people and to miracles and innovation. The observation of the Sabbath had become, through this inflexible legal system, not a way for the people to relate to God, but a yoke on their shoulders. Because of this, the leader was blind to the true needs of his people. [1]

Jesus’s healing of this long-suffering woman is truly a miracle, but it is more than that – Jesus sends a message not only to the authorities of that era, but one that has resounded through the centuries since then. He makes a clear statement that we must strive to change dysfunctional systems that keep people from getting the help they need. This story is not primarily about Jesus demonstrating temporal power by healing a woman of that era – it is about his universal and eternal message: that our paradigm and way of seeing the world should be based on love for our neighbour and that we should push against unjust systems that get in the way of people caring for each other’s needs.

Invite the congregation to think about what injustices they see in their own society or in others that prevent people from being healthy or having access to healthcare. Give examples.

Read or relate the following article excerpt to the congregation:

Several years ago, ordinary people in communities in Uganda began working together to start talking with health and government staff about things like number of staff and availability of midwives and medicines in local health clinics.

With the help of an international aid organisation called World Vision, the community members started measuring the quality of the services that they received. They pressured the authorities to improve services in 17 health clinics in Uganda. As a result, in the majority of these clinics, there has been an increase of between one and 12 staff and several clinics have appointed midwives. In some clinics, the monthly attendance of women coming in for their pregnancies has more than doubled. This has led to a decline in child deaths in these areas.

John Willy Mungoma, a health education promoter in the Tororo District, said, “Politician--at times they come and talk fast … we … act on what they have told us, but now as communities also raised their voices ... it was a combination of forces, so it .. forced us to [recruit more staff].”

Charles Wamala, Mpigi District Assistant Chief Administrative Officer, said, “There was a lot of pressure on the district, including from the politicians and the Health Management Committee of the facility. The dialogue was that we [were not acting on the] needs of the community members.”

David Wambura, Mbale District Chief Administrative Officer said, “All of us are on our toes now. We are under pressure to deliver and if we don’t, we have to explain why. We are waking up. We have taken them [the community] for granted for a long time.”

Because people in the communities decided to stop being silent, because they decided to learn about their rights and to start talking to the authorities about their rights, they were able to make sure that the government provided adequate health services. This means better care for children and increased opportunity for children to survive the first five years of life.

Ask the congregation to think to themselves about the following questions:

What are the systems, paradigms or traditions that were keeping the people in this article from getting the healthcare they needed?
How did the people come together to solve these issues?
How did their actions reflect those of Jesus?
What can you, your family, your friends and neighbours and community do to change unjust systems that are keeping people from being healthy?

Tell the congregation your own thoughts about the article and these questions.

Every day, 19,000 children around the world are dying for reasons that could be prevented with medicine and information that we have. They are dying due to reasons like pneumonia, diarrhoea, malaria, complications during and before birth, and infections suffered by new-born babies.