May 20. Jesus Christ Will Return Acts 1:9-11; 1 Thessalonians 4: service 2

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1 Jesus Christ Will Return Acts 1:9-11; 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 May 20 service 2 BIG IDEA: Jesus loves us so much that He wants us to live with Him forever. QUESTION: What are Christians looking forward to? ANSWER: To the second coming of Jesus. LESSON AT A GLANCE Jesus is in heaven where He is preparing a place for us. When He comes again, He will come with clouds of angels and everyone will see Him. Loved ones will come forth from the graves and join with those who are still living to rise up to meet Him in the clouds. We will live with Him throughout eternity. Because of God s wonderful gift of grace that offers us salvation, because of Jesus death and resurrection, we can look forward to the day when Jesus will come again and we will live with Him forever. Our acceptance of His love assures us of His love throughout eternity. The Bible describes heaven as a perfect place with no more suffering or death. We will spend eternity with God, and with friends and family. We will talk with Jesus face to face. We will play with all the animals without fear and walk on streets of such pure gold it will look like glass. Although we try, we cannot now imagine all the wonderful things we will see and do. To spend eternity with Jesus, to be reunited with loved ones, to live forever these are not dreams, they are promises from God. His gift of love extends to all who will receive Christ as their Savior and friend. A glorious future awaits us. OBJECTIVES The children will: KNOW that Jesus will come again and take us to live with Him in heaven a beautiful, happy place that God will share with those who has accepted His gift of salvation. FEEL eager for Jesus to come and excited about going to heaven to live with Jesus. RESPOND by accepting His love and praying for Him to come soon. Also, respond by thanking Jesus for His promise of a home in heaven.

2 Important Note One of kids greatest fears is the fear of death, both for themselves and for loved ones. Be sensitive to their concerns and assure them that death has no hold over them, because Jesus won the battle over sin and death when He died on the cross and rose again. Remind them that God plans for them to live a long and happy life here on earth, but that He has prepared an even better home in heaven where they will live forever with God. In heaven, there will be no fear; all the things that make us hurt or sad will be gone, and we ll get to see Jesus face to face! There is no better way to address the passing from this life to the next with children than to teach them how wonderful heaven will be and how glad Jesus will be when they are with Him in the place He has prepared for them. Heaven is a perfect home, where we will feel very much at home and will be united with loved ones who have made it there before us. Today s lesson is filled with comfort and excitement. Get ready to tell the end of the story as you let your kids know that heaven is our future home. NADA! Game /option 1 Supplies: Nada! game (three sets) There is always a match until Nada! Scoop up the dice and let em roll. Quick scan the array for matching symbols between the orange and white dice. The first to call a match collects all the dice showing that symbol. No matches? No problem! It s another chance to win. Shout Nada! to snatch up all the dice. But speak too soon and you ll pay the price. This dice game has 3 play variations. Think sharp and act fast to match, snatch, and win! Each game includes illustrated rules. Take time to look them up before class. You can also see Nada! Game in action on youtube.com If you want, later in the lesson you can refer to Nada! when you explore all the things that won t be in Heaven. Please make sure that game pieces don t get mixed up (between the three sets) and that none of the cubes get lost. Capture the Ball /option 2 Supplies: playground ball Set a ball in the middle of the room. Divide children into two equal teams, and have the teams line up against the opposite walls. Give each person on one team a number, and give the other team the same numbers. Say: I m going to call out a number. If it s your number, you and the person who has that number on the other team will race to the middle to grab the ball. Whoever grabs it first gets to bring it back to his team. Then we ll put the ball back and I ll call out a new number. Each time you capture the ball, you ll get a point for your team. The team with the most points at the end wins. Play several rounds, making sure you call each number so each child gets a turn to go. Sometimes, just for fun either call a non-existent number or two numbers together. For example, Five and seven! This means that two players from each team are allowed to run to the middle to grab the ball. You can also call, Everyone! which means that all players from each team can compete for the ball.

3 Favorite Places Supplies: Favorite Places poster, Favorite Places answer sheet, Saying Goodbye posters Show the picture of various famous places. See how many your students can guess what they are. Ask: What one place depicted on the poster would you like to visit? Why? What is your favorite place to go to? How often do you go there? What is one place on earth that you dream to visit? Why? Class leader, be ready to share about one of your favorite places. You might even want to show a photo or mementos from that place to make it a little bit more real. Say: There are so many great places to visit, but none of these compares to our ultimate destination, our true home a place that is a million times better than the most amazing place on earth. Do you have any ideas about what we will be talking about? Wait for guesses. Yes, we will be talking about Heaven. The Bible describes Heaven as God s home and the ultimate home for His children. Before we talk more about Heaven, take a look at this poster and tell me what is happening here and what the people involved might be feeling or saying to each other. Show the poster with the father saying goodbye to his son going to school. Give children time to respond to the picture. Now take a look at this picture and describe to me what is happening and what are some feelings that these people experience. Show the picture of the Army dad saying goodbye before leaving for deployment. Allow kids to share their opinions. What do these pictures have in common and what is different about them? Allow answers. Both of these pictures show people saying goodbye. In the first picture, the son will come back home in a few hours. In the second picture, the father will come back only after six months. Saying goodbye is never easy. How many of you have a mom or dad that travels? How many of you have loved ones who live far away that you don t see often? How many of you have had to pack up and move at least once in your life? How many of you had to say a painful goodbye to your best friend because his or her family was moving away? It doesn t matter if it s for life or a few days, saying goodbye is hard stuff! The hardest goodbye, though, is when a loved one passes away. When we lose someone dear to us, we begin to ask questions about death because we know that one day, we too will face the same goodbye. Where do we go when we die? Is there life after death? And how will we get there? Today, we will look at several Bible passages that answer these important questions. Alphabet Search Supplies: blank paper, pencils Form groups of two or three kids. Give each group a piece of paper and a pencil. Instruct each group to choose one person to be the writer. The writer should list each letter of the alphabet down the left side of the paper. Challenge kids to move around the classroom and try to find objects that begin with each letter of the alphabet. Instruct each group to write down the name of each object and leave the objects in their places. Allow kids to search for several minutes. Then call everyone together. Say a few letters and invite kids to tell what objects they found. Were there any letters they did not find an object for? You can tie this game to the discussion about all the things that we WON T find in heaven. Follow up with Not In Heaven activity on the last page.

4 Bible Exploration Supplies: Saying Goodbye poster, Last Supper poster Show the Saying Goodbye poster then ask: How many of you have had to say goodbye to someone who moved, or because you and your family moved? How did it feel to leave that person behind? Did you keep in touch with them? Did you get a chance to see them again? Allow answers and then say: It s never easy to say goodbye to friends and loved ones. It s especially hard if we know we will never see them again. If you move away, at least you have a chance to see that person again. But what about those people who pass on from this life? Will we ever see them again? Do we even know where they are going? One day, Jesus and the disciples gathered for a very important meal what you might hear people in the church call the Last Supper (show the poster). Jesus told the disciples that He wouldn t be around much longer. The disciples listened, and then they became sad and confused. They had followed Jesus for three straight years and they wondered where He could be going. Jesus wanted to comfort His disciples, so He gave them a promise. Open your Bible and read John 14:1-3. He said, Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God. Trust in Me also. There are many rooms in My Father s house. If this were not true, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. If I go and do that, I will come back. And I will take you to be with Me. Then you will also be where I am. Just think of it when we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior, we become part of God s family which means that we have a home in heaven! Isn t that exciting? Heaven is our future home, and it's waiting for us right now. Just think about that: God got so excited when you accepted Jesus as your Lord that He instantly made a place for you in heaven. That s how special you are to Him; He loves you that much. He s looking forward to you living with Him! It s, exciting to know that we have a place in heaven waiting for us. But it s even more exciting to know that when one of our friends accept Jesus as their Lord, God creates a place for them, too! He wants to have a place for all our family and friends in heaven. This week, I challenge each of you to tell one person about Jesus. Let them know that Jesus loved her so much that He died on the cross for them so that she could live in heaven with Him forever. Let them know that when they become a Christian, God will prepare a place for them, and heaven will be their future home! So, the first thing Jesus told His friends was that Heaven had many rooms. He describes Heaven as His father s house, and He tells them that He is going there to prepare a place for them. Jesus is saying that there will be room for His disciples to live with Him one day, but He s also saying that there will be room for anyone who believes in Him! When Jesus says there are many rooms, He s telling us that all are welcome. There s no limit to how many can come in. Jesus will prepare as many rooms as needed. That s the most important thing we want to hear when someone dies, that we will see them again. If they believe in Jesus, and if we believe in Jesus, we can rest assured that we will see them one day. God has prepared a room for that special loved one, and He is preparing a room for you as well. The question then becomes, how do we get there? You can t find Heaven on a map of the world or even the stars. But Jesus tells us that He has already given us a map to find Heaven. Read John 14:6-7. Jesus tells us that He is the only way to Heaven. As I already said, if you believe in Jesus, you will one day make the journey to Heaven. If your loved ones believe in Jesus they too will have a room prepared for them. For this reason, it is very important that we share the good news about Heaven with others. The one thing we can take from this Earth to Heaven is our friends and family, and as we already learned, there s no limit to the number of friends we can bring. There s one more important message in this passage for us: Jesus tells the disciples that He is going to come back for them. Jesus didn t simply abandon His disciples to find their way to Heaven alone. He said He would go and prepare a place, and He would come back to take them home! Revelation speaks about a time when Jesus will return to collect all of those who are left on Earth that believe in Him. Here is the truth we can stand on: Jesus will come for you when its your time. When that special loved one died, it was Jesus who came to take them home, just as He did for each of His disciples. And Jesus will come to take you home as well.

5 There s much more we can learn about Heaven, but the message Jesus gave His disciples is the foundation for knowing about Heaven. Heaven is a real place. There s room for everyone in Heaven. Jesus is the only way to get there, and if we believe in Jesus, He will come to take us home one day. What a com-forting thought to know that death is not the end for us. There is a better place for us and our loved ones, and Jesus is fixing it up for us right now! Let s spend a few moments praying and thanking God for the hope of heaven. Dear God, thank You for promising us a room in Heaven. Thank You for sending Jesus to show us the way. Help us to share the good news with others so we can fill Your home in Heaven! In Jesus name, Amen. Heavenly Drawings /extra-activity Supplies: paper, pencils, markers, crayons Pass out one piece of paper to each child. Ask everyone to draw a picture of what heaven might look like. Ask kids what kinds of things they will do in heaven. What will they see? What will they look like? Encourage them to add any detail they think might be true about the end God has made for us. After a few minutes, invite kids to share with the group what they drew and discuss what heaven looks like to them. Draw and share your own interpretation of heaven. NOTE: The conversation about afterlife can be a scary topic for anyone, especially for children who are concrete, literal thinkers. Remind kids that the Bible says there will be no sadness in heaven. And while we cannot know exactly what heaven looks like until we get there, one thing we know for sure is that it will be a happy place! Let their imaginations roam free; anything that makes us happy might be a part of heaven! If your group is struggling to think of what to draw, read Revelation 22:1-4. They can draw a few of the things that are specifically mentioned in this passage. Say: Sometimes life can be hard. On the days when something doesn t go the way you planned it and it seems that everything is falling apart, we can remind ourselves about our eternal home and find comfort and strength in the hope of heaven. Not In Heaven /extra-time activity Supplies: Not In Heaven cards Call three boys and three girls to come to the table. Boys will stand on one side of the table; girls on the opposite. Spread Not In Heaven cards face-down on the table. Explain that each card mentions something that WON T be in Heaven, however there are five cards that talk about what WILL be in Heaven. The players will take turns picking one card at a time and reading them aloud. If the card mentions something that WON T be in Heaven, the player goes into the next round. If the player chooses one of the following cards: Jesus, Angels, God s Throne, Tree of Life, Streets Made of Gold they are out. The last person to stay in the game is the winner.