Haman the Bully

Yesterday. I was teaching from the book of Esther for my Bible class. I love talking about the lessons in this book!  I was scheduled to teach chapter three: the chapter that introduces the villainous Haman.  As I was talking, the kids got real quiet (which is one of their spelling words this week and also quite (oops, another spelling word) rare) as I started discussing why I thought that Haman was a bully.  I talked about why bullies do what they do and then gave examples of some of the bullying the kids may encounter on the playground or in other social settings.  As I preached... I mean teached.. I mean taught, I just felt that I needed to really hit home that in actually bullies do what they do because they are afraid that people might find out what they are scared of, not like them, and make fun of them.  So I said to the kids, "When someone is bullying you, you need to ask this question - What are you really scared of?" With the understanding that the person they ask this to, probably will not know how to answer that at first and be thrown off. So be prepared.
It was a interesting to watch a number of the faces in the class as we talked through this.  I am praying that God gives me numerous opportunities to speak truth over this class and see some much needed changes.