Are the stories in the Bible true?
From Traditions with a Wink by Kate Erslev,
Timeless Themes by Gowdy, Moore, and Skwire, and Connections by CLF

Goal: To understand that the Bible is a collection of stories, written long ago. To understand that “truth” can mean a story that is true for us in meaning but not necessarily historical fact.

Preparation:
• Read “Background for Teachers”
• Collect a variety of Bibles from your local library, family or friends. (If you are interested in purchasing a family resource, The Complete Idiot's Guide to the Bible, by Jim Bell and Stan
Campbell—is very kid-friendly)
• Print Bible Trivia Questions and/or Bible Pictionary quotations and background and instructions. Cut into strips.
• Print “Beatitudes of Jesus” by Rev. F. Forrester Church

Activities:
Introduce the topic by saying something like the following.:
The Bible is not historically true and accurate like a dictionary, but it is not fiction, like Harry Potter books either. It is a mixture of history and stories that hold truth, like myths and poetry. As one girl said [a myth] “is something that is true on the inside, but maybe not the outside.” Stories in the Bible are not always true on the outside but there are parts that teach us something that is true on the inside.

Use the example of Jonah and the Whale. It probably couldn’t be true, but Hebrews used it to illustrate how someone who tried to avoid doing something unpleasant couldn’t escape it. Jonah tried to flee when Yahweh asked him to take a trip to Nineva and tell them about God’s message. The truth, the wisdom for us, is that when we try to avoid doing something unpleasant, it may well feel like we are being swallowed alive. Finally when we realize that we might as well just DO IT, we are released.

Think of a time when you felt “swallowed alive” by some issue—avoiding an unpleasant job or avoiding confessing the truth. Ask your kids to think of a time they did. Discuss.

UUs value wisdom and learning, changing and growing. By reading these stories and searching for the inside truth, we are being helped to learn and grow.

Play Bible Trivia Game:
Divide your family into 2 groups if possible and give each group a pile of trivia questions. One group pulls a question from their pile and poses it to the other group. Discuss among yourselves. If the group answers correctly, they try to answer another question. Continue until they are stumped, or until you want to switch roles. If you come on a question that no one knows the answer to, try to find the answer in the Bibles you have collected.

Play Bible Pictionary:
Like the popular Pictionary games, this one involves 2 teams and paper and pencils for drawing the word to be guessed. Place the quotes in a basket. Taking turns, teams draw a quote from the pile. Each quote has one key word in bold face type. The object of the game is to get your teammates to guess the key word in the quote using only pictures. After the word is guessed, the team finds the quote in one of the Bibles you have collected. Play a few rounds without a timer to see how you do and then add a time limit to make it more challenging.