252 Groups January 2015, Week 2 adjusted Small Group, 2-3. Say My Name

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1 Say My Name Bible Story: Say My Name (who do you say that I am?) Matthew 16:13-20 Bottom Line: Practice talking about God. Memory Verse: Training the body has some value. But being godly has value in every way. 1 Timothy 4:8a, NIrV Life App: Commitment making a plan and putting it into practice. Basic Truth: I need to make the wise choice. Plug In: Focus the Energy (Small Groups, minutes) Focus the energy on today s Bible story in a Small Group setting with an engaging discussion question and an interactive opening activity. Before kids arrive, pray for each regular attendee by name. Pray for those who might visit your group for the first time. Pray that He would use the kids in your group to draw other kids into relationship with Him. Ask God to give the kids some opportunities to talk with their friends about Him. Pray for opportunities for kids to talk with both insiders and outsiders about God. And ask God to give kids the confidence and boldness to share Christ with their peers. 1. Early Arriver Idea What You Need: Offering container, stopwatch or a watch with a second hand (or the stopwatch from the Lead Small App) Collect the offering from kids as they arrive. Ask individual kids to talk to you or to the group about some topics without repeating themselves or pausing to think of what to say. Start by asking them to talk about a favorite thing that happened to them this week, or a favorite song, singer, TV show, game, movie, actor, person, sport, or athlete. See if they can talk uninterrupted for 30 seconds, then 60 seconds, then 90 seconds, or even longer. 2. Talk About A Switch What You Need: Electricity Questions Activity Page copy in the room Ask the kids if they know how to turn on a light switch. Ask kids to imagine that there is a friend who is stuck in a dark room and doesn t know where the switch is to turn on the light. Tell them that before they help their friend, they have to pass a test about electricity. Ask them the questions from the page, starting with the easy questions and moving to the harder ones. It will not take long to get to questions to which none of the kids know the answers! Did you REALLY have to know all of those answers to be able to help your friend turn on the light? No. Of course not. It would be silly for you not to tell your friend about the switch on the wall, just because you didn t know all the answers to those questions about electricity. You could help your friend with

2 what you already know. When we talk to people about God, we might not know ALL the answers, but we don t need to know everything. We just need to practice sharing what we do know. [Transition] Let s go to Large Group and learn more about how we can practice talking about God. Lead your group to the Large Group area. Catch On: Make the Connection (Small Groups, minutes) Make the connection of how today s Bible story applies to real life experiences through interactive activities and discussion questions. 1. Who Do You Talk To? (application activity / great for active learners) copies in the room What You Need: Topic and People Cards Activity Pages, tape Tape the People Cards to the kids backs (or their foreheads; just don t let them see what s on their card) and hand out a Topic Card to each kid. Tell the kids to imagine that you asked them about the topic on the card and they have to find the person who knows the most about that topic. Let all the kids mix around looking for the person who can best address the topic they have. When they think they have found the correct person, they can bring the person to you and you can take up the question and the matching person card. If they don t bring you the correct person, have them keep looking. You did a great job finding the right person to tell you about your topic. [Apply] When we want to learn about something, we need to talk to people who know about that thing. When we want to learn more about God, we need to talk to those we trust who know God: parents, church leaders, pastors, and friends at church. We should also [Impress] practice talking about God with those people. That s part of why we come to church in the first place. When we commit to coming to church and practice talking about God, we can learn to talk easily about God to people who need to know about Him. [Make It Personal] (Talk about a time when a Christian friend or leader at church shared something with you and you learned something that you were able to talk about with someone else.) 2. Rumors (application activity / review the Bible story) What You Need: Bible, Trivia List Activity Page [Make It Personal] Tell an age-appropriate story about a time when you heard a rumor and then found out that it wasn t true. (Don t name any names.) Tell the kids that when Jesus was alive there were a lot of rumors about Him just like there are a lot of rumors about some people today. Read the kids two true trivia facts about some celebrities and one fake fact that you make up. (Mix up the facts from the list, so the false one isn t always last.) Let the kids try to guess which two are facts and which is a rumor. After going through your list, look up the Bible story and read it together. Explain that Jesus wanted the disciples to sort out the rumors about Him from the truth and let others know about it.

3 When you hear a rumor about one of your favorite stars or celebrities, you want to tell people the truth, don t you? Rumors can be pretty harmful and no one wants rumors spread about them or about people they love. There were a lot of rumors about Jesus and some people didn t know what to believe. That was true when Jesus lived on earth and it is still true today. There are lots of people today who are confused about who Jesus is and why He came. [Apply] When we talk about Jesus together here at church or with our parents, we are preparing ourselves to talk about Jesus with others. We [Impress] practice talking about God because we shouldn t leave others guessing when they have questions about God. You don t have to know all the answers; you just have to be honest and talk about what you do know. That s what the disciples did, and you can do it, too. 3. Memory Megaphone (memory verse activity) supplies in the room What You Need: Memory Megaphone Activity Pages, markers, scissors, tape Help the kids look up the verse and read it together. Then hand out the Memory Megaphone Activity Pages. Tell the kids to cut out the megaphone. Then have them write some things on the outside or inside of the megaphone that they know are true about God and that they can tell their friends. (Examples are: God loves everyone. God hears my prayers. God is with me.) Let them decorate the megaphones as they wish, and then have them roll up the megaphones and tape them together. Then say the memory verse together through the megaphones. Our memory verse is on the outside of the megaphone so that you can practice saying it every day this week. Our verse also is there to remind us to [Impress] practice talking about God, which is part of following Jesus and will help our friends to learn more about God. [Apply] Put this megaphone somewhere that you will see it every day and remember your commitment to talk about God. When you see your megaphone, pray and ask God to help you speak up and talk to your friends about Him. Pray and Dismiss What You Need: No supplies needed Remind the kids of what we learned today about practicing talking about God with believers and with those who don t know God. Have the kids talk with a partner about God for a short time and pray for each other to commit to talking about God. Then pray for the group and dismiss. Today we learned to [Impress] practice talking about God in two ways. We need to talk about God with people who know God well, like our parents, leaders at church, and friends who know God. We also need to talk to everyone about God, especially when people are confused or have questions about who Jesus is or what we believe. [Apply] Make a commitment this week to spend time talking to someone you know who knows God and talk about what you believe about God and who Jesus is. If you believe in God like Peter and the disciples did, then you might get a chance like they did to talk to other people about what God has done for you.

4 Take a minute right now and talk with your partner about God. Tell each other your favorite story or something that God did in the Bible, and what your favorite thing about God is. Then pray for each other so that you will be brave, like Peter was, to speak up and talk about God when it is needed. FOR LEADERS ONLY GOD VIEW: the connection between COMMITMENT and God s character, as shown through God s One Big Story Have you never had to endure a child learning how to play the clarinet? It s pretty awful. Sounds more like a person strangling a duck then anything close to actual music. But that goes with any musical instrument, doesn t it? To become great at playing an instrument, you need to practice to rehearse. You need to commit to sticking with it even when you don t feel like it. This is true for faith. To grow to mature takes practice. It takes commitment. Which is why we re taking a whole month to discover how commitment can show up in our lives as we practice our faith. Commitment is making a plan and putting it into practice. If we want to know God better, we need to practice our faith. But this isn t something that comes naturally to any of us. That s why we need a plan to put into practice. And the best place to start is with faith skills. Every so often we like to come back around and focus on four faith skills that kids can practice to help them grow in their faith and know God better. We use four words to help us remember these skills: HEAR. PRAY. TALK. LIVE. Each week this month, we ll focus on one of the faith skills as we talk about making a plan and putting it into practice. This month, let s think about how: (1) God created commitment and exemplifies it in being committed to us. (2) Commitment is both a reflection of and a response to God s character. We can demonstrate His commitment to us as we commit to knowing Him more. (3) Commitment is how we follow through on the tasks set before us. This week, we re discovering: Talk. We can know God better by talking about Him with others. But this week isn t just about talking about Jesus with people who don t know Him yet. There s another important element of talking about God. As kids process their growing faith, they will have questions and doubts. We want kids to know they can talk about God and work through their question with others who also believe in Jesus. We ll spend time in Matthew 16:13-20 and look at the moment when Peter declared what he believed about Jesus in front of all the disciples. Our Bottom Line is: Practice talking about God. We can all share our story of faith with confidence knowing that Jesus is who He said He is.

5 Our Memory Verse is 1 Timothy 4:8a, Training the body has some value. But being godly has value in every way. (NIrV) When we commit to practicing our faith and follow through on our plan, we ll grow in such a big way that it will impact our entire lives.