Week 7: Daniel

This week in our series "Drama & Dedication: The Life of the Prophets", we talked about Daniel.  Daniel was a young Jew who was exiled to Babylon (remember what we said about Babylon last week?).  Daniel ended up being one of a group of young men who were chosen to enter training for the king's court...maybe in hopes of being loyal subjects to the king one day.  Many of us can remember several stories in the Bible with Daniel in them...stories like Daniel and the lion's den, Daniel interpreting King Nebuchadnezzar's dreams, Shadrach, Meshack and Abednego and the fiery furnace.  To get us in a "Daniel" sort of mind frame, we acted out a spontaneous melodrama which is a no-rehearsal, slapstick humor skit!  Ours was entitled "Daniel in His TV Den" (a new take on Daniel in the Lion's Den).  We even had people acting as chairs and tables!

Obviously, our skit wasn't exactly how the real story went.  But sometimes with these stories that it seems we have heard one thousand times, we start to miss or forget the point of them.  But these stories in Daniel are not just well known, they are timeless.  They still speak to us today and they can have new things to teach us each time we read them!  Daniel's stories offer us great looks at integrity, wisdom and courage.

We split into middle and high school groups and took a look at several of the well known stories in Daniel.  We did a sort of "book review" and identified examples of how Daniel shows integrity, wisdom and courage in each of these stories.  We talked about how Daniel stayed true to himself and his faith, took time to examine his situation and pray to God before reacting, and showed true courage and strength in times of trial.  We realized that often today's society goes against these virtues...we are encouraged to conform and change who we are just to please everyone and get ahead in life.  Unlike Daniel, there is typically little threat to our lives based on our religion in our country and time, but we are still faced with challenges where we must also show integrity, wisdom and courage.  We read other Scripture passages that can teach us more on how to display these virtues (see passages like Psalm 1:1-3, 2 Timothy 3:14-15, Psalm 28:7 and Isaiah 40:31).  Ultimately we see that Daniel practiced his faith on a daily basis and that helped him stand up to the trials he faced.  We are also called to do that same!  How are you showing integrity, wisdom and courage this week?  Comment on this post with your answers.

We then played a few games including "Cat and Mouse" as we are reminded to have courage and listen for direction even in dark times, and "Big Bunny".  Check out the pictures below!