SAM_4366 (2)

1. The Army
2. Quake
3. The Storm
4. Snare
5. Army Camp
6. Thirst
7. Poverty

Allegory Story Introduction – Why I Wrote These

“They don’t care about towers.”

That was my realization, as I was teaching our Wednesday night Kindergarten/First Grade class about Proverbs 18:10. It made sense – they had no conception of towers as an application into their life. None of them had ever needed to go into a tower to be safe. None of them had every been given security by running into a fortress.

So I decided to tell them a quick story – “Okay, imagine if …” – about a child, maybe around their age was running from an enemy (or a wild animal? I hadn’t planned it out very well). As I described the danger, I became aware of something interesting – the whole class was quiet, and their eyes were focused on me. I imagine that you can guess – it’s a rare thing to have 30 six and seven-year-olds sitting still and listening. And then I told them about the child running into a fortress, provided by the King. I pressed in on how the walls of the tower made the child feel safe.

And then, as I was finishing the story, I knew something else:

“They don’t know they need a tower.”

But now, I had their attention. And I could tell them that all of them – in fact, every person – is like that young girl who cannot protect herself from the danger. And that led right into the gospel, and why we all need a tower, provided by the King, to save us. And what is the tower?

The Word of God uses a lot of allegories and similes and sometimes we can fly by them and not let them empty into our lives, our situation, our status. This is especially true of children, who might often think the stories are about adults or for older people. And here’s where stories can help.

Stories can bring us emotion and connection and highlight need. Stories can help us connect with truth as told by God’s authors in His Word. That’s what I’m trying to do in this book of stories.

I don’t mean for these to be stories for parents or stories for children. I mean for them to be stories that parents read to their children.

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