Paul

Love God, Not Money

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Hi all! This lesson is from 1 Timothy 6. This is another part of Paul’s letter to his friend Timothy.

Similar lesson can be found HERE.

In this part of his letter, Paul reminds Timothy (and us) that we should be thankful for what we have. He says when we are born we have nothing and do you know when it’s time to die and go live in heaven we don’t take any of our stuff with us? (But heaven will have ALL the BEST stuff you could ever ever dream of! The Bible is sure to tell us it’s a very happy place and no one ever feels sad.)

Paul says if we have food and clothes then we should be happy. But do you know most adults and a lot of kids aren’t so happy with that? They always want MORE MORE MORE! But a lot of times, that makes people make bad choices. Maybe they are sneaky at work to get more money, or maybe they just buy LOTS of stuff instead of helping people.

Paul says “the love of money is the root of all evil.” Have you ever seen a plant? Maybe there is a pretty flower on top and a stem and under the flower, and down in the dirt are roots. The roots keep the plant safe in the ground and guide the flower which way to grow. Whatever we love is like our deep roots…it shows us which way to go. The root is the start and it determines which way the flower grows. If we love God, our roots are in Him and we will grow more and more like Him. If we love money, we will always be searching for more STUFF, more money and starting like that just leads to more and more bad choices.

Instead, we should try to be like God.

Money is not evil. We need money to buy things, like food, or your house. Money is a part of life. But we can’t love money…we can’t spend more time thinking about money then God, or spend more of our time trying to get money than we do serving God.

(In Matthew 6:24 and Luke 16:13) Jesus said, “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.”

For our craft today we cut out a circle, some petals and a wavy piece of brown construction paper to be dirt. We glued those on our paper and drew on a stem and some roots.

On the roots we wrote “the love of money is the root of all evil” and on the flower we wrote “Love God more than money.”

(It’s a simple reminder but I may change it later to something more along the lines of, “Love God, Not Money” instead…oh well). I hope these lessons are a good start for your family in your Bible time and that you can have some good discussions. (I know my 4 year olds have some pretty funny things to say sometimes about the Bible lesson…but I also know God cherishes laughter and is so happy to know His children are learning about Him.)

Lord, help my short comings and help each mom, dad and teacher who takes the time to teach their children about You. Guide our words and help us see in the moment what is most important. Thank you for entrusting these children to us and for helping us through as we do our best to raise them. Please guard our hearts against the love of money.

Thanks again for joining us, love to you all.

Set an example

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Hi all! Today’s lesson is from 1 Timothy 4:12, a letter Paul wrote to his friend, Timothy. (Our lesson and craft on this from last year can be found HERE).

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Paul’s friend Timothy was kind of a young guy in the church and Paul wanted to remind him that even though he was young, he could still set an example for other Christians in the his speech, in life, in love, in faith and in purity.

Do you know that grown ups can learn from kids sometimes? Even grown ups can learn to make better choices and be more like God. And kids who love God can be good examples. You can be a good example of God’s love in the things you say, the choices you make, the love you show other people, and by trusting in God. When we love God we want to do things He says are good for us.

Instead of fussing with your brother or sister, you can show them love. Instead of using mean words with a friend you can show love and use nice words (even if they aren’t.)

Don’t worry about what other people think (don’t let people look down on you) you just do the things you know God wants you to do. Even young people and even kids can be GREAT examples of God’s love.

This week, try to make good choices that show everyone what it means to really love Jesus.

Here is our song this lesson. 

Thanks for joining us again. Love to you all.

Set your mind on Jesus

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Hi all! Today we will finish our lessons from Paul’s letter to the Philippians. This bit comes from Phil 4:8.

After Paul reminds the people to talk to God when they are worried, he tells them this:

“Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.”

Instead of focusing on the things that worry us, first he says “think of things that are true.” These are things like “God loves me. God died for me. God can do ANYTHING! God made EVERYTHING. He loves EVERYBODY and wants them to know Him. It’s important to think about these things and remember them.

Then he says thinks about things that are nobel and right. This means thinking about good things, not yucky things. Do not think about lying or stealing or hurting someone. Think about how you can help others and show them God’s love.

We are to think of things that are pure and lovely and that remind us to praise God. Like stars in the sky or a friends hug. Anything that reminds you of God’s goodness is a good thing to think about.

We can set our minds on Jesus. Can you turn your brain to Jesus? Go ahead…turn your little pretend knobs and think about Jesus. Set your mind on Him, the things He wants you to do, the things He has made, the things He says are true.

For our craft today we drew a big head with a face and then wrote in the brain area the things we should think about.

Our bottom text says: I will set my mind on Jesus. Phil 4:8

 

This song from Steven Green goes along with today’s lesson.

Thanks again for joining us. Love to you all!

Don’t be anxious

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Hey all. Today’s lesson is from Philippians 4.

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This is still part of Paul’s letter to the Philippians (the people of Philippi). In this part of his letter, Paul tells the people “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and petition (that means asking God), with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”

This means we don’t have to worry! If we start to worry should we cry? Or hide under our bed? Eat a lot of junk food? No…Paul says if we are worried to PRAY! We can always talk to God. We can talk to God with a thankful heart and ask Him for the things we need.

Now…can we ask God for a trip to Disney World TOMORROW??? We can ask…but He will probably say no. Sometimes God says yes, sometimes He says no, and sometimes He says wait. Just because we ask God for something doesn’t mean we’ll get it right away. But do you know what we WILL get? The Bible says He will give us peace. He will calm our minds and our hearts. If we are worried, and we talk to God, He will help us.

Maybe He will remind us of a Bible verse that says He is control. Maybe He will tell us He loves us, and we can trust Him.

No matter what you are worried about, God wants to hear it. And He wants to help you feel better.

Is there anything you are worried about today? Anything you want to talk to God about? Maybe you and your mom or dad or grandparent can pray right now and talk to God about the things that make you nervous or anxious. Then WAIT. And let God speak to your heart. Maybe He will tell your mom or dad what to say. Maybe He will remind them of a Bible verse they know. But talk to God always…He wants to give you His peace.

 

Thanks for joining us. Love to you all.

Shine like Stars

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Hello again! Today’s lesson is also from Philippians 2. This is from Paul’s letter to the Philippians. (These letters were written by Paul, but Paul was very close to God and knew God’s heart. We can know that if it’s in the Bible, it’s something God wants us to see and know. Some things in the Bible that people do are bad examples, things God doesn’t want us to do. But in these verses, Paul shows us something God DOES want us to do.)

We learned last time that Paul told the people to serve like Jesus. In that same letter, he also told the people this:

“Do everything with complaining or arguing so that you may become blameless and pure children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation. Then you will shine among them like stars in the universe.”

We are to do EVERYTHING God wants us to do (part of that means obeying your mom and dad) without complaining or arguing. “But I don’t want to!” “But SHE made the mess!” “This is TOO HARD!” “I cleaned it up LAST time!”

He says if we can obey with a happy heart, without grumbling or complaining, it will make us more like God– we will be blameless and pure children of God.

Then we will shine like stars in the universe. Have you ever looked outside at night? Do you remember how BLACK the night sky can be? And how a star SO far away can be SO bright compared to that black sky? People who do not obey with a happy heart are like the black sky. They have black yucky hearts. But when we obey with a happy heart, without complaining or arguing, we are like a bright light…like a star shining in the universe.

For today’s craft we cut out a star and wrote the verse on it. Then we added some glitter and hung them in the kids’ rooms so they can be reminded of today’s lesson.

 

We also found THIS song from Steve Green posted by Kendall Sauer.

Thanks for joining us. Love to you all.

Serve like Jesus

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Hi again!

jesusserves

Today’s lesson is from Philippians 2. Paul wrote another letter–this time to the people of Philippi–the Philippians. In this letter, Paul reminds the people about Jesus. He says “Do nothing out of selfish ambition” Do you know what that means? Being selfish means thinking only about yourself. “ME ME ME, MINE MINE MINE.” When someone is selfish, they only think about what THEY want, and not about other people.

Paul tells the Philippians (and us) to instead, “value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.” (That means think about OTHER people! Do you remember when Jesus told us to love our neighbor as we love ourselves? Treat people the way we want to be treated.)

He says “Be like Jesus.”  Jesus is God’s son, so He has all the power God does, and He lives with God in a perfect place….but because He loves us, He made himself nothing and came to earth as  a servant, becoming a man. He humbled himself (accepted God as King and obeyed Him) and He even became obedient to death—even death on a cross! (Remember Jesus didn’t WANT to die on the cross. He prayed and asked God if there was any other way to save us…but there was not. So He obeyed God.) And because He obeyed, God raised Him up and the Bible says that eventually every person will bow and worship Him.

Jesus came to serve. He healed people, He taught them, He washed their stinky feet and He loved them–even enough to die for our sins. (Remember the consequence for our sins is to die forever, but Jesus died in our place and now when God looks at us, He doesn’t see our sins, He sees us as perfect if we love Jesus).

Jesus did not think about ME ME ME MINE MINE MINE, He thought of others. Paul reminds the people to not think all about ME ME ME, but to think of other people too.

How can WE do that?

(Share our toys, help our mom and dad, let our brother or sister have the last cookie)

Selfish=Me Me Me Mine Mine Mine

Humility=not thinking you’re SO important…letting GOD be the most important

Can you and your family make a list of ways to serve other people?

 

Thanks for joining us. Love to you all!

The Armor of God

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Hi all! Today’s lesson is from Ephesians 6 (last year’s lesson and craft can found HERE)

 

So in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, he talks about armor. When soldiers fight, they wear armor to keep them safe. We have armor that keep our HEARTS safe from the enemy, Satan. What does Satan want to do? He wants to keep us away from God. Sometimes we might think “God doesn’t really love me” or “I don’t REALLY have to obey God.” Or a friend might say “God’s not real.” These are ways Satan tries to keep us away from God. BUT, Paul reminds us that we can fight against those lies from Satan and keep our hearts loving God.

But how do we do that? We put on the armor of God. (We added a piece of clothing for each item and talked about what they meant as we added them.)

We have a belt of truth. The truth is God’s words in the Bible. We remember that God made everything, He can do ANYTHING, He is in charge of EVERYTHING and NOTHING will keep Him from loving us.

We also have the breastplate of righteousness. A breastplate is a piece of armor that covers your heart and lungs in your chest. Being righteous means being right with God…making good choices to obey God.

We put on the shoes of peace. That means we are ready to GO! walk, travel and tell people about Him!

We have the helmet of salvation–we remember Jesus died for us. HIS sacrifice saves our hearts from Satan.

The shield of faith–we believe in God. Sometimes God can be confusing…but we CHOOSE to believe Him. We trust that He will take care of us and keep us close to Him.

And lastly, the sword of the Spirit. The sword is our only weapon and it’s not even anything WE do. God’s spirit will fight Satan FOR US.

 

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So we have the belt of truth-the Bible.

The breastplate of righteousness-we obey God.

The shoes of peace-we tell other people about Him.

The helmet of salvation-Jesus saves!

The shield of faith-we trust in God.

The sword of the Spirit-God fights for us.

(We recited this part several times together)

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We also found this song from KidSpring Children’s Ministry.

And this lesson review from Saddleback Kids.

 

Thanks for joining us! Love to you all!

Unity: Working Together

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Hi all! Today’s lesson is from Ephesians 4. Paul wrote another letter, to the Ephesians. In this letter, one of the things he tells the people is to work on unity. Do you know what unity means? Unity means “being all together”…being one. We live in the United States of America. We are united…all the states work together to be one country. And all the people who love God can work together (unity) to share His love and tell other people about Jesus.

Paul reminds the people that everyone has different ways they can serve God. Some people do the talking on Sunday morning, some people lead the singing. Some people help take care of kids of older people. There are LOTS of ways to show God’s love, but none of them are more important than any other. We all work together. We are united. We are united to share God’s love, to worship Him and tell other people about Him.

Do you have any friends that go to a different church? Do they still worship God? Is your church better than theirs? Nope. Just different. If we love the same God, then we are united. We are together. We can love God together and we can love other people together. Paul says it’s important to work together because that helps us know God better and grow in Him. (Remember yesterday we talked about the fruits of the Spirit and growing in God?) Other people can help us grow in God. They help us learn about Him and they show us ways to love people. We should all work together, we can have unity.

Unity: working together.

For our craft today we wrote out the word: UNITY: working together

Then we cut out a few pictures of people working together and glued them around the word unity.

 

Thanks again for joining us. Love to you all!

Fruit of the Spirit

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Welcome again!

Today’s lesson is from Galatians 5.

(Our lesson from last year can be found HERE)

So this time Paul was writing a letter to the Galatians (people who lived in Galatia). In this letter, one of the things Paul reminds the people is to live how God wants them to live. He says before they knew God, they did whatever they wanted. And everyone sins….so what showed was their sin…they were angry, and mean and thought only about themselves. But, he says, once we know God, God’s spirit lives in our heart and we should become more like Him everyday. And that will show too! (How do we get closer to God? We pray and talk to Him! We sing praises to Him and we read the Bible: His words to us).

The things we do that show we are sinful or that show we follow God are called fruit. Just like fruit trees grow and show off fruit, people grow too and show off what’s inside their heart. Sometimes people grow more and more into their bad choices. Sometimes, they grow more and more to be like God. A yucky tree makes yucky fruit and a good healthy tree makes yummy fruit. Just like trees, people who make bad choices show off yucky things and people who make Godly choices will show good things. These are called the fruit of the Spirit. The fruit is what shows when God’s spirit lives in your heart. And the more you become like Him, the more these things will show.

So what ARE the fruits of the Spirit? Paul says they are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness and self-control.

We drew trees with 9 branches and then drew a picture for each fruit as we discussed them.

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Love-heart

Joy-smiley face-(being excited about God’s plans)

Peace-cloud-(not worrying, but trusting God)

Patience-clock-(waiting with a happy heart)

Kindness-flower

Goodness-halo-(obeying God)

Faithfulness-mountain-(always trusting God, not loving other things more than God)

Gentleness-lamb

Self-Control-tongue-(being able to take time to make good decisions, not just doing whatever we want right away. We drew a tongue for this one because it can be very hard to think before you use your words to make sure you are using NICE words).

 

And since these are fruits of the Spirit…that means this is what God is like! If we are like Him, we will show these things and He is love, He is joy, He is peace, He is patient, He is kind, He is good, He is faithful, He is gentle, and He has complete self-control.

Also:

We like THIS VIDEO from the “What’s in the Bible” series.

There is also THIS SONG from Steve Green’s “Hide ’em in your heart” album.

This is our song for the fruit of the spirit.

Thanks again for joining us. Love to you all!

Giving generously

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Hello all!

giver

Today’s lesson is from Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians, chapters 8 and 9.

In this part of Paul’s letter he is reminding the people to be generous. Do you know what generous means? It means giving a LOT! What kinds of things can you give?

(Money, clothes, toys)…the most important thing Paul says we can give, is Jesus! We can tell other people about Him and show them His love.

We can share our toys, we can give money or clothes to people on the street who don’t have any. We can sponsor a missionary (someone who goes around the world telling people about Jesus), we can sponsor a child, and we can give our money and our time to our local church. We can spend time with a grandpa or grandma who can’t leave their house much. There are SO many ways to give!

Paul says “God loves a cheerful giver.” That means it makes God happy when we give with a happy heart.

He said, since you try to do the right thing and be like God in your faith, and when you use your words, learning lots of things, and in love, see that you also do a good job giving.

Maybe you and your family can make a list of ways you can give. This is another thing that you don’t have to be a grown up to be good at. Anyone who loves God (even kids) can be a great giver!

The Bible tells us that everything we have is a present from God….and that none of it will last forever. So let’s share the things we have with a happy heart, just like God shares with us, especially His love.

(No craft today), but we enjoy this song from Steve Green (posted by Christian Singers VEVO).

Thanks for joining us, love to you all!