TEACHING GUIDE FOR CHILDREN Season of Prayer for State Missions & Golden Offering for Tennessee Missions

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1 Teaching Guide for any childhood audience (ages 6-12 grades 1-6) including Girls in Action, Royal Ambassadors, and Children in Action groups. SUGGESTED DATE: September 11-18, 2016 THEME: It s Personal! Reach. Connect. Give. SCRIPTURE: How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can anyone preach unless they are sent? As it is written: How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news! Romans 10:14-15 NIV BEFORE THE SESSION: PRAY As the leader/teacher, you will want to cover yourself, your children, and the time in prayer! 1. Pray that God will prepare your heart as you prepare to lead the children. 2. Seek God s guidance in preparing activities that will best teach YOUR children about God s love for people and the need to tell others about Him. 3. Ask God to give you a heart to feel the urgency of sharing His love with children and their families. 4. Pray that the children will understand the need to tell others about Jesus. BEFORE THE SESSION: PLAN Prepare early for the lesson so that you can find teachable moments within the scheduled activities. 1. Read the entire teaching guide for children. Make note of activities that are most appropriate for the time you have and the children in your class. 2. Preview the videos at or on the 2016 Golden Offering for Tennessee Missions DVD (check with the church office). Select a segment to show, if appropriate. The segment on Journey Camps would be appropriate for this age level. 3. Gather and organize all of the materials you will need for the session. Be sure to plan for visitors! 4. Invite all children in your church to attend the special study about Tennessee missions. Send a postcard or note to each child and be sure to talk to parents about the study. A few weeks before the study, have the children make a Remember the Time card (put together shapes, numbers, and pieces to make an old-fashioned alarm clock) with the time and date at the bottom of the card and send home with children as a reminder. missions and ministries through the. 1

2 BEFORE THE SESSION: PREPARE Before the session, gather materials needed for all activities. Below is a checklist that includes materials for ALL activities. You may choose not to select all activities, so prepare accordingly. Materials:.2016 GOTM Promotion DVD or download video from TV/DVD player Map of Tennessee Construction paper Markers/crayons Glue or tape. Offering envelopes (one for each child) Bible Pieces/shapes for the alarm clock craft GUIDING THE SESSION: Arrival: 1. Organize all materials and set up activities prior to the arrival of children. 2..Make sure all teachers/leaders arrive early and are prepared to greet children at least 15 minutes before the session begins. 3. Welcome each child. Introductory Activity: Divide the group into two lines. Instruct the children to put themselves in order by shoe size: without talking! (Assist any children who may not know what size they wear prior to starting.) Emphasize that they can use their hands, or motions, but they should not talk. After they complete the activity, divide into two different groups and ask the children to organize by what month their birthday takes place (January December). At the end of the game, discuss how we tell people about Jesus. Sometimes we don t speak the language or may have people who don t understand what we are talking about when we share about Jesus. But, because we are loved, we want to do our best to make sure they hear about Jesus and how much He loves them! Remind children that we know we should tell people about Jesus and sometimes we need to memorize verses, phrases, and Bible missions and ministries through the. 2

3 truths to tell people how God loves them. In our Bible story today, we ll hear about some of the very first missionaries. BIBLE STUDY: Acts 13:14-52 Paul and Barnabas in Antioch Say: Our Bible verse for our lesson is Romans 10:15b: As it is written: How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news! (NIV). As we think about getting to our feet to reach, connect, and give of ourselves in our community, we are going to read and learn about a time when Paul and Barnabas went into their world and taught people about the hope of Jesus. Ask: Have you heard about Paul and Barnabas before? (allow time to answer) Say: In the book of Acts, the Bible tells stories of Paul and Barnabas who were sent out to travel and tell others about how much Jesus loved them. Paul and Barnabas would go into the town and meet with people. They would tell the people how Jesus loved them and cared for them. In Antioch, they started at the synagogue that was the church where the Jewish people met to read the Old Testament. After the Jewish leaders read from the Old Testament, they asked Paul to speak and teach them. Paul shared how God led the people of Israel and gave them leaders and kings. He then shared about how Jesus had come to be a leader and the Savior of the World. (You may want to read a portion of Acts 13: This is a long, somewhat difficult passage so select portions to read aloud and/or use a translation that s easier for the children to understand.) Jesus was the promised Savior written about in the Old Testament. Paul continued to teach the leaders how God sent Jesus to be the Savior for both the Jewish people and the other people in the world called Gentiles. Sometimes this made people angry, but Paul and Barnabas knew that God wanted them to tell people about Jesus everywhere they went no matter who those people were. Paul and Barnabas stayed in Antioch and had the chance to share about God and many who heard believed in Jesus. Paul and Barnabas left Antioch and journeyed for a long time sharing the good news of Jesus to the Jews and to the Gentiles they met. missions and ministries through the. 3

4 Paul and Barnabas knew that not everyone had heard about Jesus, not everyone knows that God loves them. There are people in our towns and around the state who do not know that God loves them. Close in prayer. MISSIONS STORY: Materials: Map of Tennessee (highlight your town on the map), TV/DVD player to view segment of 2016 TN State Missions DVD (recommended: the Journey Camps video segment), GOTM gift envelopes. View the GOTM video together. After watching the video, talk about what kids learned about at camp and what skills kids might have learned at camp that would be helpful to be missionaries. (Allow time for discussion. Suggest the need to have skills for living in areas where things aren t as easy as they are in our home towns, the ability to know more about Jesus to help them as they tell their friends and neighbors about Jesus, and other examples). Display the map of Tennessee. Have children find your hometown on the map. Discuss: What skills/knowledge would somebody need to talk to people about Jesus in your school? Say: Missionaries around the world feel the need to share Christ. They know that our world has many people who do not know about Jesus. This is true for missionaries and leaders who work in Tennessee. The missionaries here know that there are many people in our own neighborhoods who do not know how much God loves them and the great work that Christ has done because He loves us. We can work together to try to reach our neighbors, connect with them, and give them the truth of Jesus love! Ask: Who are your friends at school? Can you tell them how much Jesus cares for them? What Bible stories do you know that can help you in teaching your friends about Jesus? (Allow time for questions and discussion.) Give: Hand each child a offering envelope. missions and ministries through the. 4

5 Say: Every year at this time, we take a special offering for state missions. It is called the Golden Offering for Tennessee Missions. The money given to this offering will help missionaries share the story of Jesus with people who haven t heard about Him. This is an envelope for your offering. Our theme this year talks about how personal it is when we take the time to go to a friend, to reach out to others, and to give. When we give we help others be reached throughout our state. Collect the offering if the children came prepared to give tonight. MISSIONS ACTION ACTIVITY: Time to Pray: Put together a prayer walk for children. Place cutouts of feet around the room that the children can follow. Create stations representing some of the missions stories shared in the 2016 Week of Prayer Guide (Examples: put canned foods on a table to represent food pantry ministry; put jump ropes, sports equipment to represent camps; display Bibles in different languages to represent ministries to other cultures.) Put cards with prayer prompts (prayer requests, things to pray for). At the end of the prayer walk, put paper cutouts of feet and crayons at a table. Ask children write the name of a person they know that they can tell about Jesus. Have the children put them on a poster or bulletin board. Play quiet worship music as the children follow the feet to pray. You may do this as a group, all going together, or you can start the children in small groups to move on their own. Close in prayer. Offer one final prayer with all children. DISMISSAL: 1. Gather all items for the children to take home. Try to greet each parent as the children are dismissed. 2. Thank you for giving your time to children s missions! Written by Julie Heath, TN WMU Preschool/Children/Student Missions Specialist missions and ministries through the. 5