Creativity, community and Jesus – that should be brought into harmony over the weekend in Ottobrunn. That is when the Lego city makes a guest appearance in the community center of the Free Evangelical Congregation Munich-Southeast. The organizer is the association “Children discover the Bible” (KEB). Over two days, children between the ages of seven and twelve can build a 20 square meter city according to their ideas.
Lars Göhl from KEB is bringing 200,000 terminal blocks to Ottobrunn for this purpose. These came together almost exclusively through donations, says Göhl. An enormous amount of effort goes into pre-sorting the terminal blocks. You have to sort, sort out and, if necessary, wash the stones, explains Göhl. That was a process that had taken years. In the past, presorting was even finer, but that turned out to be too complicated for the children. The event aims to create a connection between Lego and the preaching of Jesus and the Christian faith. Between the construction phases, songs are sung and stories from the Bible are told. Preferably building stories, such as the construction of Noah’s Ark or the Tower of Babel.
Lars Göhl from the “Children discover the Bible” association comes to Ottobrunn with the Lego City.
(Photo: Sebastian Gabriel)
Lego and religion are issues that are actually not related. “The children shouldn’t combine faith and church with something boring. Church services don’t always have to be dusty and dry,” says Göhl. The feedback from past Lego city weekends has always been positive. Families outside the church have also shown enthusiasm, says Göhl. “I am always amazed at the results.”
Prefabricated kits are hardly used. According to Göhl, the children build freely, innovatively and creatively. Some are also based on familiar buildings in reality. At an event in Füssen, for example, a child recreated the White House from Washington DC, says Göhl. He himself had to learn over the years that it was the children’s city and not his. “I would look at it with a perfectionist view, but you have to look at it with a child’s eye.”
Terminal blocks come in all sizes, shapes and colors. Many people still associate it with a single manufacturer: Lego. The Danish company has become an indispensable part of children’s rooms. The colored stones are also popular with older children and adults. As a collector’s item, decoration or even as an investment item. The master carpenter Ole Kirk Christiansen founded the company in 1932. Lego blocks as we know them today have only been around since the late 1950s. Plastic toys experienced the big boom a few decades later, in the eighties and nineties. Since then, Lego has held its own among the big names in the toy industry. Classics such as Lego City opened the gates, licensed items such as Star Wars, Harry Potter or Batman appealed to a new generation of children. With their own creations such as Lego Ninjago, other generations of children are introduced to Lego today. The colorful stones are impressive in their versatility. The imagination knows no limits. I can imagine something figuratively? Then I can build it out of Lego. Some stick to the instructions, others just go for it, they are united by their love for the Danish toy manufacturer. You can certainly assign many adjectives to Lego, but not one: cheap. Sets that appeal to an older audience, in particular, are often in the three-digit, sometimes even four-digit range. Those who are familiar can even use Lego as an investment. Certain sets, usually larger, rarely sold and rarely sold, that are no longer officially sold by Lego, can multiply their value over the years. ysch
The Lego weekend begins with a construction phase on Friday from 3:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. It continues on Saturday from 9.30 a.m. to 5 p.m. On Sunday from 11 a.m., the Lego city can then be visited as part of a family church service. Registrations are still possible until October 21 at www.muenchen-suedost.feg.de.