Thursday, August 5, 2010

church for kids unit - Following Jesus

Nathan and Robyn and Kutz and Mel and Andrew and I have been working on a 4 week Sunday School unit on the Christian life. I started wanting to do something similiar to what Tim Chester does in his book 'The Ordinary Hero' but they ended up like this.

Title : Following Jesus

Fun drama : Biff and Bash and the Outdoor Motor Cycle Gang. Biff and Bash follow their leader in everything. Their motto is Tatts, Glasses, Bikes, Moustaches (these are things their leader has). The drama is silly and just introduces the idea of following someone means valuing what they value. And it introduces the idea of tattoos!

Tattoos : Each week we give the kids a tattoo with our Following Jesus logo and the word of the week (Salvation, Obedience or Service). The idea is that it helps the kids remember how to live. And looks cool.

Week 1 - Introduction - Being a Christian is about following Jesus. Being like him. Valuing what he values. Loving what he loves. The things that are important to him are the things that should be important to us.  The next three weeks we are going to be learning about 3 things that were really important to Jesus: S-O-S : Salvation - our Salvation, Obedience to God, Service to others.

Week 2 - Salvation - It was really important to Jesus that we be reconciled to God, have sins forgiven etc. Jesus died to make that happen (explain). Are you friends with God? Are your sins forgiven? Do you care whether other people are friends with God? It is important to Jesus that people are God's friends. If we're following him, it will be important to us too.

Week 3 - Obedience - (Mark 14 bible focus) Jesus did what God wanted even when it was really hard and he didn't want to. 'Not my will but yours be done.'  We follow Jesus in this. Obeying God is important to us too. We do it even when we don't want to.

Week 4 - Service - (Mark 10 bible focus) Serving others was important to Jesus. Jesus didn't come to be served but to serve. We follow him in this. Life is not about what I can get out of it. It is about what I can give to others.

Bookwork - Written for three different levels - pre-reader, early reader, reader

Logo/Tattoo: Ben did the pic.

4 comments:

  1. excellent job all round. so nice to see some material that deals with the christian life in a way that makes sense and is also hugely challenging for kids (and adults)
    Jesus looks great. kudos to Ben!
    Chris L.

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  2. See, now I'm really glad I asked! (Thanks)

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  3. I think I've worked out what I'd add to 'salvation' in week 2. I think it could be helpful to choose a particular thing which Jesus thinks it's important that we be saved from, so we can focus solely on that.

    There are a number of different things that we can and would say that we're saved from, so picking one as a consistent message would be good for both teachers and kids, I reckon. Makes it a bit more concrete.

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