Advent-Day 5-Abram

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Hi all.

This month we are learning about God, Jesus, and Jesus’ earthly family.

The next person in Jesus’ family tree that we will learn about is Abram. (For complete lesson on Abram, see here).

From Genesis 12:1-7, after Noah got off the ark, his kids had kids and they had kids and they had kids and eventually there was a man named Abram who loved God. He was already a very old man when one day God told him to GO! Abram didn’t know where he was going, only that God said He would show him the way. So because Abram trusted God, he packed up his things and his wife and he went. He traveled around and around, living in his tent, waiting for God’s instructions. He didn’t have to know what the plan was, because he trusted God who knows everything!

God is omniscient (that means He knows EVERYTHING). Psalm 147:4-5, Isaiah 46:9-10. When things don’t make sense or seem confusing, we can trust that God is in control and that He knows what is going on. He has the answers.

Well, when baby Jesus was in Mary’s tummy…Joseph (who was going to marry Mary) was VERY unsure. He didn’t know how a baby got in Mary’s tummy because they weren’t married yet?! God knew Joseph was unsure and while he slept God sent an angel to talk to Joseph. The angel said, “Don’t worry Joseph. It is ok. God has chosen Mary to be the mommy of baby Jesus. And you will be his daddy. You will take care of him and love him. This is from God.”

Joseph trusted in God too, and even though he was very surprised, after that, he trusted that God was in control. Matthew 1

Bible story: Abram

Attribute of God: all-knowing

Jesus’ birth story: the angel reassures Joseph

Craft:

Side one of our ornament today is a tent (we drew a triangle basically and cut it out and then glued it to our background circle).

Our text reads: Abram trusted the all-knowing God. Gen 12:1-7, Is 46:9-10, Psalm 147:4-5

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For the other side we drew Joseph’s praying hands as he looked to God for the answers. We cut those out and glued them to our background circle.

Our text reads: The angel came to Joseph to tell him not to worry. Matthew 1

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Then as usual, we taped a string on one side, and glued the circles together to form our two-sided ornament.

Thanks for joining us, love to you all!

Advent-Day 4-Noah

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Welcome back!

This month we are learning about God, God’s Jesus and His earthly family.

 

The next person in Jesus’ family tree is Noah.

For our complete lesson on Noah see here. (this story below will be a more abbreviated version)

After Adam and Eve had sinned, they had to be apart from God. Well everybody after them sinned too. And finally God was so sad with everyone disobeying Him that He said everyone and everything would be washed away in a big storm…everyone EXCEPT a man named Noah and his family (because they tried to love and obey God.) (Gen 6:9-22, 7:17-24, 8) They were also to save a mommy and a daddy of every kind of animal.

God spoke to Noah and told him to build a boat, called an ark. Noah and his family and the animals would all be on the boat during the big storm. Noah obeyed God and trusted Him. And God was faithful (that means He kept His promise) and the rain came down for 40 days and 40 nights. And everyone and everything was washed away. After the flood, God promised to never again destroy the earth with water and as a sign of His promise, He put a (do you remember?) a rainbow in the sky! God kept His promise to destroy everything and His promise to save Noah, his family and the animals on the ark. God is always faithful to keep His promises to us. (Deuteronomy 7:9, Psalm 36:5)

 

Now when we think about the story of when Jesus was born, we can think again about God’s faithfulness. (Luke 1) After God put a baby (baby Jesus) in Mary’s tummy an angel came and spoke to her. The angel said, “Don’t be afraid. God is very happy with you, Mary, and He has chosen you to be baby Jesus’ mommy!”

Mary was surprised and confused, but she said, “Ok. I am God’s servant. I believe. Let it be so.” Mary knew she could trust God.

Bible story: Noah

Attribute of God: Faithfulness

Jesus’ birth story: Mary accepts God’s gift

Craft:

For the 1st side of our ornament today we made a rainbow and filled it in with tissue paper.

Our text reads: Noah obeyed God. God is faithful. Gen 6:9-22, 7:17-24, 8

Deut 7:9, Psalm 36:5

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The other side of our ornament is a purple circle with a cut out of Mary bowing and then we gave her a face.

Our text reads: Mary obeys God with a happy heart. Luke 1

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Then again, we taped a string on one half and then glued them together to make our ornament.

(Our ornaments on our “family Christmas tree”…on the left is the Bible story side and on the right is all the Jesus’ birth story sides).

Thanks for joining us. Love to you all!

 

 

2018 update: This year we changed the Mary form to a glittery heart and we opted for do-a-dots instead of tissue paper for the rainbow.

Advent-Day 3-Fall of Man

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Hi all. This month we are celebrating Jesus’ birth with an advent countdown where we learn about God, baby Jesus and His family.

So after God created the heavens and the earth, He made man. A man named Adam and He gave him a wife named Eve. (For the complete story and lesson see here).

Adam and Eve disobeyed God and ate the fruit He told them not to. (Gen 3:1-19) That was the first sin (bad choice/disobeying God). When they sinned, there was a consequence. Because God is perfect and their choice was not, they could no longer stay with God and live forever. From then on, all people would make bad choices and sin, and be apart from God. We all NEED someone who can take the consequence for us, so we can be right with God again.

God sent Jesus to be our salvation, the One who would save us from our sins. Sin came into the world from one man (Adam) and sin would be taken care of by another man (God’s son Jesus). (Romans 5:12-19)

 

When it was time to send Jesus to earth, God put a baby in Mary’s tummy. Mary was going to get married soon to a man named Joseph, but they weren’t married yet. When she told him she had a baby in her belly he was VERY surprised. “You can’t have a baby in your belly? We aren’t married yet?!” He thought maybe Mary had been sneaky and married someone else and had a baby with them! He was ready to walk away and not get married. Joseph and Mary would have been separated forever just like our sin separates us from God. (It’s a good thing that’s not the end of the story!)

 

Bible story: Fall of man

Attribute of God: Savior

Birth Story: Joseph Questions

Craft:

For our ornament today, we will start with Bible side. We cut out a black circle and a white circle from construction paper. Then we cut the white paper in half and glued it on the black (so our circle was half black/half white). Then we cut out 2 halves of trees, one black, one white and glued them on the opposite color 1/2 circle. (So black on white and white on black)

Our text reads: Fall of man Gen 3:1-19, Rom 5:12-19

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For the other side, we cut out another white circle and a question mark.

Our text reads: Joseph questioned, “How can this be?” Luke 1 (BUT it SHOULD be Matthew 1)

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Thanks for joining us today. Love to you all.

Advent Day 2-Creation

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Hello all!

Today is Day 2.

This month we are learning about God, Jesus and His family.

 

The first thing was God. God was. He always was. And then, He created the heavens and the earth. (Genesis 1:1, Isaiah 66:2, Nehemiah 9:6). God made everything! People, plants, animals, the stars, everything. He is a Creator. A creator is somebody who makes things. Do you like to create things? God LOVES to create things. His favorite thing He ever created was us, people. (Gen 1:26, 1 Peter 1:12). God loves us so so so so much! (John 3:16)

The first part of Jesus’ birth story begins the same way. God made baby Jesus and put Him in his mommy’s tummy. (Luke 1) Jesus is God’s son and God made Jesus for a special reason. (To later die for the sins of all people which we will discuss more as the advent calendar continues). God created the heavens, the earth, and a very special baby who is God’s Holy, perfect son, but He was also a regular baby boy. (Hebrews 2:14-17)

Bible story: creation

Attribute of God: Creator

Part of Jesus’ story: Jesus was created in His mommy’s tummy

Craft: (as a preface, I like to have my kids do as much of the craft as possible, so they will all look very hand-made and unprofessional)

We made our first ornament today. This ornament is two-sided (as they each will be). To make side one, we cut out a circle from blue construction paper and then ripped up pieces of green paper and glued them on to make an earth.

Ours reads: Day 2: God created the heavens and the earth. Gen 1:1, Neh 9:6

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For the other side, we cut out a similar-sized circle from pink construction paper and then a pear shaped baby and gave him a face (who unfortunately sort of resembles the Planters peanut guy–oops). And then we put little baby Jesus into the pink tummy.

This side reads: God created a baby in Mary’s tummy. Luke 2

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Lastly, we taped a piece of string onto the back of the blue circle, then glued the two circles together to make an “ornament” to tape to our tree.

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Thanks for joining us. We’ll have more tomorrow. Love to you all!

 

 

 

2018 update: This year we have four kids, so we are making two ornaments each day. We will hang both, one with the old testament story side out and the other with the nativity story facing out. You can have each child make one front and back, or have all your kids work together on one, or split them like we did. Whatever works for your family…just be sure to leave yourself enough room on your tree to fit all of them!

Advent Day 1-Tree

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Hi all! Welcome to the official launch of this year’s advent calendar. (Each day will be a small devotion to share with your kids that includes a Bible story, a part of Jesus’ birth story, an attribute of God, and a craft.)

 

This month we will be studying about Jesus and His family. We will learn about some of the people that came before Jesus, but also, did you know that WE are part of Jesus’ family too?! The Bible says that if we love God and obey Him, then we are God’s children! (2 Corinthians 6:18) God is our Father!

And that makes Jesus our brother! Jesus said anyone who loves God and obeys Him is Jesus’ brother! (Matthew 12:48-50).

So sometimes when people talk about families, they say families are like a tree. The parents are the roots and then they have kids (like branches) and then those people have kids (more branches) and then THEY have kids (even more branches!) (Isaiah 11 talks about Jesus’ family and how He would be part of a family tree).

So this month, while we talk about God and baby Jesus and His family, we will make ornaments for a family Christmas tree.

Part of Jesus’ story: Jesus had an earthly family…parents and grandparents before Him

Attribute of God: God is Jesus’ Father and ours too if we love and obey Him

Craft: Today, I took 4 pieces of regular construction paper and drew 3 lines on each. Then the kids cut on the lines (to make strips of paper). We taped the strips together and assembled them to make a tree.

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(If you don’t want to make whole tree to hang on your wall, you can just use your family’s regular Christmas tree as an example and put your ornament each day on that.)

Then we made the stump from brown construction paper and taped that on also.

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Thanks for joining us today. Love to you all!

 

 

 

2018 update: This year because our kids are bigger we added Isaiah 11 to the trunk of the tree.

Advent 2015

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Welcome back, all! As we are entering the month of December, we are preparing to begin our month of advent, or eagerly awaiting the Lord. Of course now He is here! So we will review this month the stories of the old testament, our need for a savior, the attributes of God and of course, the story of His earthly birth.

 

Each day will have an old testament story, an attribute of God and a snippet of the birth story that all correlate, along with a craft/ornament. We will assemble all of our ornaments onto one big tree. I will post our study each day, but below is the general outline. I hope you’ll join us this month. (This year will look a bit different, but i will include a couple of pictures from last year’s advent calendar of Bible stories we made.)

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You can download a printable excel version here:

advent

 

Or PDF

advent

 

 

 

Looking forward to December. Love to you all!

Psalms of Thanksgiving

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Hi all! Today we are talking about the book of Psalms. A Psalm (sawlm) is a song.

There is a whole book of the Bible just of songs! Most of them were written by King David (David and Goliath, King of Israel), but some were written by other people.

Mostly the songs are either asking God for help, or thanking God for all He’s done for us.

Did you know you can sing songs to God when you are sad or happy? Even when you are mad or confused!

In America, we have a holiday called Thanksgiving coming up, and it’s where we spend the whole day being thankful for all God has given us. ‘

There are MANY psalms about being thankful to God.

One that is really good for kids is Psalm 100.

 

“Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth.
Worship the Lord with gladness;
come before him with joyful songs.
Know that the Lord is God.
It is He who made us, and we are His;
we are His people, the sheep of His pasture.
Enter His gates with thanksgiving
and His courts with praise;
give thanks to Him and praise His name.
For the Lord is good and His love endures forever;
His faithfulness continues through all generations.”

 

For the month of November, we collected some sticks from our yard and each day we write on a leaf something we are thankful for. Then we tape them to the sticks so by the end of the month, we have a very full thankful tree.  (So it’s currently about 1/2 full). *side note, young kids may need a bit of direction like “what is your favorite food? favorite animal? favorite place to go?” (or else each day they will say they are thankful for the carpet, and the ceiling, or they will say mommy every single day…not that that’s so bad hehe)

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Also for Psalm 100 we used some toy instruments and made music for God. This week we made some homemade microphones. Taking a plastic cup, I cut a strip of white paper and taped it around the cup so the kids could decorate it how they wanted. Then we wrote “Make a joyful noise to the Lord” on the cup. Next, I used some scissors and stabbed a hole in the bottom of the cup and the kids could sing through the hole and the cup acted as a megaphone.

 

 

Lastly, could your family make up a song of thanks to God? You can use the “abcs” tune or anything you want, and just thank God for all He’s given and done for you!

Thanks for joining us today. Love to you all!

 

 

Job

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Hello all

Welcome back. We’ll be finishing out November with some odds and ends from the old testament and a brief history of the 400 “silent” years from the old to new testaments.

Today’s story is about a man named Job (found in the book called Job). We did the “marshmallow” version (found on pinterest) as listed below.

Job was a man who loved God. He was also a very rich man. He had lots of money and sheep and cows. He had a lot of children and a wonderful wife. He was a big important person and everyone thought he was great. He talked to God a lot and tried to do everything God wanted him to do. (hand kids a few marshmallows *could use any treat you have* each time you list something good Job had…but instruct them not to eat them yet.)

One day, Satan (God’s enemy), came to God and said, “You know Job only loves You because You give him everything. I bet if You take everything away, he won’t love you anymore!”

So God took away Job’s children (take some marshmallows), and his sheep and cattle. (take more marshmallows) He took Jobs wife away (take more), He even took Job’s health and he became very sick and ouchy. (take the rest of the treats.)

How do you feel now that all your treats are gone? Are you sad? Mad?

Do you know what Job said? He said “I know You gave me everything, and i know You can take it all away. I will still praise You. I will still love You.”

Job was sad, very very sad…but he still trusted God and knew God was in control.

Job’s friends came and do you know what they said? They said “You must have done something REALLY REALLY BAD! This is a bad consequence for your sins!”

But Job hadn’t done anything wrong.

Job needed his friends to be with him and help him feel better, not tell him he must have been bad. How do you help a friend when they are sad?

God reminded Job that HE WAS in charge and that sometimes sad things will happen to us, but God still loves us. Sometimes when sad things happen, God will help us love Him more. Sometimes, it helps us love other people more. Sometimes…we won’t know why God let the sad thing happen…but we can ALWAYS know that He loves us and will take care of us.

And do you know what happened at the end of Job’s story? God gave him even MORE sheep and cows, more children and he was healthy again! (give kids LOTS of treats they can now eat).

We can always know that God loves us and is taking care of us. We might not get everything good while we live here. But if we love God, we know when we die and go to live in heaven with Him that He will share with us ALL the greatest things, better than anything we have now.

Is there anything sad in your life today? Can you thank God for helping you through it and for loving you no matter what?

For our craft today, we traced our hands, palm up and then cut out a heart. We attached the heart using bendy straws so it would stand up on the hands and look like the hands were lifting up God’s name.

We wrote “God” on the heart and Job 1:21 on the hands. “The Lord gives and takes away, but blessed be the name of the Lord.” Which means, God gives us everything we have and He can take it away if He thinks that’s best…but we can love Him no matter what because we KNOW He loves us and is taking care of us.

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Thanks for joining us. Love to you all!

Nehemiah

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Hi all!

Today’s story comes from the book of Nehemiah.

Some of the exiled Israelites had returned to Judah and were rebuilding the temple, but many were still in Babylon and spread around away from the promised land. One, named Nehemiah was working for a king.

One day he went to the king and looked sad. The king said, “Nehemiah…why are you sad?”

“How can i be happy when i know my people are struggling and my city is a mess?! It’s all in ruins….”

“How can i help you?” asked the king.

“I would like to go back and help them rebuild,” Nehemiah responded.

The king told Nehemiah he would miss him, but it would be ok if he went.

When Nehemiah got back, the city was a mess. The people were poor and sad, and the city was all burned down. Now, back then, each city had its own big big big walls around to keep it safe from other bad guys…but the walls around Jerusalem (the main city in Judah), were all destroyed.

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Nehemiah encouraged the people to begin rebuilding the walls and they all got to work. Everybody worked on the part right by his or her house and together they got a lot done.

But…some of the nearby bad guy neighbors didn’t want the people to fix the walls and they tried to get them to stop. “You think you can actually rebuild this whole thing?! You think this city will be great again?!”

But that didn’t stop Nehemiah and the other Israelites…they kept on working.

Even when the other guys came up with a plan to attack the city…Nehemiah prayed and then told half of the people to stand guard, ready to fight and the other half to keep working.

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The people fixed the gates (the big doors) into the city and each family worked by their house to finish the whole wall. Nehemiah and the people prayed to God to help them and to keep them safe from their enemies…and finally they finished it. Their enemies were NOT happy, but the people came together and sang songs and praised God for helping them.

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All the people worked together and they were able to complete the work. They didn’t even have to go far! We can all work together to do great things for God too and we don’t have to go far either! We can love and take care of the people close to us. We can help keep our church clean, we can help  mom and dad take care of the house, we can help a friend who is sad, or maybe help a neighbor. God can use all of us just by loving and serving the people God gave to us in our school, our neighborhood and our family.

Who is close to you that you can show God’s love to today?

Thanks for joining us, love to you all!

Ezra

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Welcome all!

Today’s story is from the book of Ezra.

The Israelites had all been taken captive out of the promised land. King Cyrus of Persia had taken over Babylon and God softened his heart so he decided the Israelites could return home. They went back in three groups. The first group went back and two of the priests, Zerubabbel and Jeshua, and their helpers started to rebuild the temple (God’s house and church). The people worked hard, but their enemies who lived near them kept trying to stop them.

Sometimes when we are doing something that will make God very happy, Satan and his helpers will get people to try to stop us. But we know we should ALWAYS do what makes God happy.

The people had a big celebration and remembered when God had saved His people and led them out of Egypt a long long time ago to the promised land (called Passover). The priests started serving again and even though lots of people tried to stop the Israelites from coming back and rebuilding the temple, God made sure they could get the work done. He even had the kings return the things from the temple that were stolen when the Israelites had to leave. God took the people from the land, and GOD helped them return. He always had a plan for His people and He brought them back home.

But they started to forget some of God’s rules, and a few years later, a priest named Ezra brought some more of the people back to Jerusalem (the capital city of the Israelites). Ezra prayed to God to keep him and the people safe as they traveled. God kept them safe and when Ezra got back to the promised land he reminded the people of all of God’s laws. They had just been in exile for disobeying God and Ezra reminded them of all the words of God so this time they could obey Him. Ezra helped the people understand that a temple for God is nice…but it doesn’t mean anything if we don’t do what He says.

You can go to church every week, read your Bible and pray…but if you don’t DO what God says to do, then it doesn’t really matter. Ezra reminded all the people that God looks at our hearts and cares if we obey Him. Building a fancy church is nice, but obeying God is MORE important.

For our craft today, we made hammers to symbolize the rebuilding.

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We also found this video posted by Jelly Telly that gives an overview of the book of Ezra.

Thanks for joining us today, next time we’ll learn about Nehemiah! Love to you all!