timothy

Love God, Not Money

~ hebidsthemcome ~ Leave a comment

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

~ hebidsthemcome ~ Leave a comment

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.

Growing Together

~ hebidsthemcome ~ Leave a comment

Hi all, today’s story comes from Acts 18.

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Paul was traveling all around teaching people about Jesus and next he went to a city called Corinth. There he met a man named Aquila and his wife Priscilla. They were tent makers and so was Paul so he stayed and worked with them. Every Sabbath (church day) he talked in the synagogue (like a church) teaching everyone about Jesus.

His friends Silas and Timothy had been teaching other places but they came to help and then Paul stopped working on tents and spent all his time preaching, telling everyone Jesus was the Messiah. Some of the Jews (God’s chosen people) didn’t like hearing that God loves EVERYONE and that He sent Jesus to die for EVERYONE! They thought it should only be for them! So they kicked Paul out of the synagogue.

But God told Paul to stay and keep teaching and lots of people came to know about Jesus.

Paul stayed on in Corinth a long time then he left and took a boat to Syria; Priscilla and Aquila went with him. Paul kept traveling, but Priscilla and Aquila stayed in a place called Ephesus.

There they met a Jew named Apollos. He knew a lot of the Bible and loved teaching people about God. But he hadn’t learned a lot about Jesus yet. When Priscilla and Aquila heard him teach, they invited him to their house and taught him even more about Jesus and God’s plan to save everyone.

Apollos then began going around and helping OTHER people know more about Jesus and he traveled a long way and was very good at teaching and helping people know God.

I think this is a fun story because Silas and Timothy helped Paul so he could teach Priscilla and Aquila, they taught Apollos and he taught lots of other people!

In a book of the Bible called 2 Peter (written by Peter, Jesus’ disciple and friend), he says “Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” The Bible talks a lot about growing. You can grow older, bigger, and stronger. You can also get to know people more and grow a friendship. The Bible tells us to grow in how much we know about God. We can also grow in how much we trust Him and how much we worship Him and serve Him (the things we do to show other people His love.)

Paul wrote a letter to the people of Colossia. In Colossians 3:16 he says, “Let God’s words live in your heart, teach and admonish (that means help each other when you make bad choices) one another with all wisdom, and sing psalms and songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God.”

It’s important to grow in how much we know God and how we serve Him…but we can’t do it alone. We need parents, teachers, pastors, worship leaders…anyone who knows God can help someone else know Him better. Even you! Even though you may be small now, you can still help tell other people the things you know about God! Just like Apollos still had things to learn, you probably do too! (And let’s be honest, adults do too!) But you can help sing songs to God and tell other people about Jesus. We can all help each other grow just like Paul, Silas, Timothy, Aquila, Priscilla and Apollos did!