A story on the theme of Genesis 50.15-21

Topic: Going Back in Order to Go Forward

Theme: God breaks the power of the past as we put trust in Him and in building up our own character that enables us to overcome all the hurdles of life.

Change the names and genders and parental configurations as works best for your context.

Dan was afraid of what his big brother, Jeff, might do to him when their parents left the house to go to a BBQ that night. He had been playing with Jeff’s new skateboard even though he knew he wasn’t supposed to and he hit a sharp curb and took a big chunk out of the edge. He didn’t tell Jeff, but he knew that Jeff would know who did it.

Dan and Jeff’s parents said goodbye to them and told Jeff to take good care of Dan while they were gone. They’d be back in a couple hours. As soon as they left, Dan disappeared. As he heard Jeff moving around the house, he moved to places that Jeff wouldn’t find him. After about an hour, Dan heard Jeff call his name -- over and over. Dan decided he needed to come to Jeff or he’d get in trouble later with his parents. 

When he came into the room where Jeff was, Jeff could see something was wrong, particularly when he saw Dan’s shocked look at the skateboard in his hands.

Dan stood as far away as he could and was ready to run if he had to. Jeff laughed. 

He said, “I think I know why you’ve been hiding. You were using my skateboard, weren’t you? You took this chunk out of it, didn’t you?”

Dan said, “Yes. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. Please don’t hurt me.”

Jeff said, “I thought about it. I knew you did it, but you disappeared when Mom and Dad left and I had time to think about what happened. First, I remembered that I promised them that I’d take good care of you. Then I remembered that I did something like this to our cousin Phillip’s skateboard and Phillip didn’t hit me, he forgave me. He said that it made his skateboard look cool. So I forgive you. I won’t hurt you. After all in a few weeks, I’ll have put lots more dents and gashes in it and no one will even notice this little chip out of it.

(editor’s note: You could include mention of Jesus’ saying if we want forgiveness we need to be forgivers.)