Stories of Jesus for Children 3 - what happened next, and an Easter Garden!

When Jesus got into Jerusalem on his donkey, everyone wondered what he was going to do next. I think he surprised them all - he went to look in the temple, the special place where they worshipped God, and he got really angry! He got so furious because he found people there who were selling, and even cheating, inside God's house. He was so angry that he pushed over the tables where they'd been selling their things.
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You can see who got really mad with him, though - it's the important people again, who wonder where on earth Jesus gets his ideas from. They want to stop him before he does anything else to change the way things work. They like things the way they are!

But Jesus kept on going back to the temple, and the ordinary people loved to listen to what he told them about God, and God's ways. The important people were too scared to stop him when he was in the temple, because there were so many ordinary people there to protect him. I'll tell you more about their sneaky plans tomorrow.

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Question for younger children: Was Jesus being naughty when he got angry?
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Question for older children: Is it always wrong to get angry? What things DO we do wrong when we get angry?

Activity: The best way I know to tell the stories of Jesus this week is to begin an Easter Garden. These are photos of my boys and their dog, making one last year. First, you'll need a container. We used a china serving dish, but you could use a plastic container too.

Put a layer of gravel or broken pot into the bottom of the container.

Then fill the container, most of the way to the top, with soil or potting compost.

Find some moss - that's easy in our garden! I hope you can find some, too, on rocks or under hedges, perhaps.

Press the moss down over the earth.

Use some rocks to make a little cave in one corner of the garden.

If you don't want to use rocks, you could use an old flower pot to make the cave, but you'll need to cover that with moss too. Don't forget to keep the moss nice and damp when you get it indoors - we spray ours with water every day.
Your Easter Garden is ready for now - we'll add different things to it as the week goes on. If you like, you could put a little donkey into it today, to remember how Jesus came into Jerusalem.