Does anyone know who this is a picture of?
Yes it’s the BFG, The Big Friendly Giant.
Now Giants aren’t known for being friendly but this one is as Sophie, the little girl in the story finds out.
Now the BFG spends his time collecting dreams – he keeps the good dreams, destroys the bad dreams and stores the good ones in his cave. When children are asleep he returns the dreams to them so they have a good night’s sleep
That story always reminds me of a bible character, called Joseph
He was also involved in Dreams, not catching them but he had amazing dreams, given to him by God. Theses dreams told him what was going to happen in the future.
Now Joseph had 11 brothers – can you imagine that! And he was a bit of a show off. We usually think of the story where he got a fabulous coloured coat!
But he was also a Dreamer – and one of his dreams involved 11 bunches or sheaths of corn. These 11 bunches of corn bowed down to his, which was standing in the middle.
Remember he had 11 brothers? Well he told these brothers he thought the dream meant they would all bow down to him
As you can imagine the brothers weren’t very happy about that so they tried to get rid of him and eventually sold him as a slave. Joseph must have been very upset. One minute he was a favourite son and the next no one cared about him at all. I think he must have changed a bit though, and maybe became a bit more humble because he worked hard as a slave and eventually became the person in charge of the man’s house!
Some people didn’t like him and he got thrown into prison but once again he worked hard and the guards liked him so they let him talk to the other prisoners. One of these prisoners worked for the King and a long time after he was released and working for the king again – the king had a dream. The prisoner told the king about Joseph and Joseph ended up explaining to the King that his dreams meant there was to be 7 years of lots of food and then 7 years of famine where there was no food.
Now this bit reminds me of the BFG too – because Joseph built big sheds and collected all the good food up for the 7 years, a bit like the BFG collecting dreams. When the famine came and there was no food – Joseph ordered the sheds to be opened and the food was handed out, only the good food a little bit like the BFG giving back only the good dreams
So those stories both talk about collecting in things that you have a lot of and giving them to people that don’t have any. What do you have a lot of? Well, you might give away your clothes when you grow out of them. You might give away food to the Food Bank at Harvest time, or when you go shopping. You also have amazing things like Friendship to give away, or time or your creativity. When my children were little, they loved making pictures and I used to give them away to friends who didn’t see them very often. Is there someone in your class who needs a friend at the moment? Or is there a neighbour who you usually ignore but you could just smile at and say hello? Or maybe you could send a card you have made to your Grandad?
Time for reflection
So for a few moments I want you to close your eyes and be silent
Think about what I have told you about Joseph, how he worked really hard, even when things weren’t going well for him and how he listened to God and then he could understand what those dreams meant
Think about what you have, food, clothes and homes. How can you share them?
And the 3rd thing is to think about those things that you have like being friendly, being creative, having time to make a card. Who could you help with those things?