Recently I was asked to speak at a Christian school assembly.  The audience, for want of another word, was made up of students from Kindergarten to Year 12, also the parents would be there.  So I had to come up with a talk that would be suitable for kids and parents, for Christians and non-Christians.

What do you do?

My solution was to rely on the power of story.  I went to the parables.  Since the theme of the service was thanksgiving, I went to Luke 17:11-19.  It is short, it is surprisngly not well known and it is about thanksgiving.  In fact it makes a good point about thanksgiving being the right response to the gospel because the gospel is about grace.  There is a nice little twist in the tail when Jesus tells the Samaritan that he would make him well (Greek:σέσωκέν) even though he has been healed.

Having the passage is one thing, working out how to tell the story is another.  I could simply read the passage, but I want people to think carefully about it.  I could tell a modern rendtition of the story and then read the passage and get people to work out the differences.  This would mean they have to listen carefully.  But how do I tell a modern rendition, or at least one that might be more interesting.  I could find a video that someone else has made, but there is something about that that takes away the power of the story.

So I came up with the idea of telling the story with a soundtrack.  To make things easier I added the story to the sound track and simply mimed the story.  I then read the passage.  Then I asked people what the differences were.  Finally I spoken for about 3 minutes on why this was important for understanding the gospel of grace.

If you would like to use the soundtrack or see hear what it sounded like, you can download it here.