Reflections: Weddings. Miracles, and Vampires

     The scripture story for the week was the story of Jesus' first miracle at the wedding in Cana from the Gospel of John. During our Extended Session time, I decided to use our snack time to further experience the story with the children. At snack time we passed around some foods that might have been served at a wedding during the time of Jesus.  The grapes and olives were big hits but the figs and dates only appealed to a few kids.  Then -  my bright idea was to take two pitchers of water and use red food coloring to "turn the water into wine" right before their eyes.

"Look - it looks like blood."

"Yeah, blood. We are drinking blood."

" Hey guys, we are all vampires 'cause we are drinking blood"

Of course they went there. They are kids.

Me: "Okay, friends we are not talking about vampires today. Let's think about what a miracle it was to have all that water turned into wine."

And then...

"Yeah - wine. Wine that looks like blood!"

So the blood conversation and comments about vampires and zombies continued - much to my dismay.

Then we passed around a basket of crackers.

" Hey, crackers. These crackers are the flesh! We are eating the flesh and drinking the blood."

"Yeah, the crackers are like the bread that we dip in the wine sometimes."

"Can I dip my crackers in my fake blood?"

Boom.

These kids - in the middle of chatter about vampires and zombies  - make a connection and recognizes the Communion elements.

So, I make sure to acknowledge and draw attention to the comment about the flesh and we talk about Communion for a few minutes and what it means. I ask them to try to think of other stories from the Bible that involve water, and wine, and Jesus.
The water turned to wine as he performed his first miracle.
The wine and the bread - the blood and the flesh - that Jesus shared with his disciples.
 For a few minutes, the vampires and zombies are not a big deal anymore and they are experiencing the story.

The kids are experiencing communion with each other and exploring how the stories are connected through Jesus.

That's church.

Vampires, zombies, blood, and all.