The Great Wall of Prayer

Want a great activity for your kids to connect the story of Nehemiah with prayer?

Recently our kids at church learned the story of Nehemiah and how he re-built the wall of Jerusalem.  I wanted them to do an activity in which they could build their own wall and also connect it with prayer (as Nehemiah prayed to God during the time of the re-building of the wall).  So, I decided we would create our own “Great Wall of Prayer”.

Each class was given their own blank brick.  For the bricks, I used a template I found online (http://cathedralkindergarten.blogspot.com/2013/09/1.html).  On the bricks, we told them to write down or draw pictures of things they wanted to pray for.  Or if they wanted, they could write out a prayer to God (more for our older elementary kids).  After they did this, they could decorate their brick if they wanted using markers.

When each class was finished, they brought their bricks to our hallway and started building the wall.  Each class built on the other classes which formed our Great Wall of Prayer.

In reading through the list of prayers, I was so touched by the things they wanted to pray for:  grandparents health, pets who were sick, friends, parents.  There were two that really stuck out to me, though.  On one brick a little child asked God to provide them with food.  This child does not have a lot of money and this child’s teachers were concerned when this very shy child immediately spoke up and said they needed food.  We checked with a close friend of the family who assured us that they had food, which I was thankful to hear.

Another prayer said this:  “Dear God, please help me get through my parents divorce.”  This broke my heart.  My parents divorced when I was 8 years old and I understand the sadness she feels.  Definitely a hard time in the life of a child.  I pray that she will be able to get through her parents divorce and realize that God is with her every day.

This was a fun activity to do with our kids as we learned the story of Nehemiah.  Every time I pass our prayer wall I find a brick and pray for their request and also for the child who wrote it.  Sweet prayers from children and a great reminder for them that we need to take everything to God in prayer.