Teaching Sunday School

This Sunday I taught Sunday School for the second time at the church I attend here in Mbeya. I left it feeling very tired and somewhat dejected. Let me share the experience with you…
…I arrived a few minutes early. Six children were waiting for me – five girls aged 8-10 and one toddler. I couldn’t really do the game I had planned with that number of children, so I started with Simon Says, hoping that more would turn up. None did. So then I did a little relay race to get the names of the first five books of the Bible – the problem was that only one of the children had been there the previous week so they hadn’t got a clue how to put them in order. Finally I started the teaching, and a few more children arrived. I persevered in teaching them about Jeremiah – an example of someone who gave up his time to tell people the words of God (as we are doing a series about the Bible, using some Swahili Sunday School materials). Gradually the number of children increased, but it was always the same two or three girls who put up their hands to answer questions. By the end there were probably 30 children packed into the little room, some of them arriving just 10 minutes before the end of the hour-long class!
So, if anyone has any suggestions on how to teach children who arrive at different times, are of a wide variety of ages, who don’t own Bibles and may not even have access to one at home and who don’t even seem to know the story of Moses in the bulrushes, please share them with me!! And pray for my ability to communicate with them clearly in Swahili – I’m sure my inaptitude in this area is part of the problem! Jesus said, “Let the little children come unto me… for of such is the kingdom of heaven.” I hope that these little children will come to Him and come to love His Word.