Books of the Bible - Lesson 2 All Grades Principle: The Bible is God s Word for us. His Word should be what shapes our view of Him and what informs every aspect of our lives. Scripture Reference: 2 Timothy 3:16 PERSONAL PREPARATION: Before this weekend, make sure you are familiar with the copies of the Hands-On Bible in your cabin. This week we will be showing our campers the features found in these Bibles and how to use them. This is a practical, hands on lesson to make the Bible more accessible to our campers. Excerpt from 30 Days to Understanding the Bible by Max Anders: It has been said that the message of the Bible is so simple, the smallest child can understand it, and so deep that the most profound scholar cannot plumb its depths. On its simplest level, the Bible tells us that God created us in His image, and loves us with a love so great we cannot comprehend it. For reasons hidden in the mystery of God s will, humanity sinned against Him. This sin separated all mankind from God, and destined us for an eternity in hell. Yet, because God loved each one of us so much, He sent His Son, Jesus, to die in our place. Because He was God and sinless, the Father is willing to place our sin on Jesus and give Jesus righteousness to us. He does this when we believe in Jesus as the risen Son of God, and receive Him, or accept Him as our God. This we must do by a simple act of faith. When, in faith, we acknowledge to God that we believe in Jesus and accept Him as our personal God, being willing to turn from our own life to follow Him, God forgives our sin, past, present, and future, and gives us eternal life. From that moment, we are destined for heaven as a child of God. God wants us to live for Him while still on earth, so our lives must be committed to following God as best we know how. We discern His will for our lives by reading the Scripture and doing what we find there, as best we can. Spend time rejoicing in the simplicity of the Gospel and that God has made it accessible to all. Pray that God will reveal His truth to our campers through these weeks as we look in His Word. Spend time reflecting on your own actions and pursuit of God. Ask the Lord to reveal more of Himself and His will for your life as you read the Scriptures and prepare for this week. PLUG IN TIME - 5-10 minutes as the kids begin to arrive Arrive early to check the supplies in the bin and review the lesson. Write today s principle on the whiteboard. Remember to greet all campers upon arrival; meet their parents; welcome and introduce all visitors. Create a Revised: 4/17 1
welcoming cabin for all campers! Books of the Bible Board Game Over the course of the three-week Books of the Bible series we will learn more about God s Word and practice practical ways to increase our knowledge of the Bible. Start class each week by playing the Books of the Bible Board Game to help your campers learn the names of the books of the Bible. (Teachers Use the binder clips to clip the two sets of cards (Old Testament and New Testament) back together at the end of the game.) BIG GROUP TIME - 35-40 minutes As you line up, remind campers we are going to have fun as an entire Camp Grace group! We are going to live out GRACE by Glorifying God through worship, Respecting All Leaders, and Accepting Responsibility to listen with attentive ears, minds, and hearts - fully Celebrating Christ with passion! We should Encourage Others to do the same, by not distracting them from their worship of God. Small Group Time - 25-30 minutes Getting Started If your cabin did well in Big Group, acknowledge it. If not, take a couple of minutes to talk about how they can do better next time. Supplies: Memory verse guide (1 per bin) Books of the Bible bookmark (1 per bin) Spend some time going over the memory verse the campers learned last week. Ask for volunteers to recite the verse. Use the memory verse guide printout for cues, if/when needed. Ask them how they memorized it, where, how often they worked on it, if they got help, etc. Engage them in a conversation not just to see if they did memorize it, but also to offer helpful advice and tips about spending time in and memorizing the Word of God. Great job! Today is the second lesson in the Books of the Bible series. This is a time to explore the Bibles we use in our cabins and at home. We want you to be able to use God s Word in our Camp Grace lessons each week, but also on your own when you re not here at Grace. The Bible is a pretty big book, and spending some time now to learn more about how it was written, how it s laid out, and what all it has in it will be a big help in learning how to read and use the Bible for years to come. Make sure campers have copies of the Hands On Bible. Have them partner and share, as needed based on numbers. Last week we talked about the Bible being one big book, made up of lots of smaller books. Does anyone remember how many smaller books there are in the Bible? (66.) That s right there are 66 books in the Bible. Those books are divided into two main sections - does anyone remember what those are? (Old and New Testaments.) Revised: 4/17 2
The Old Testament has 39 books while the New Testament has 27. Who remembers what the phrase Old Testament means? What is that part of the Bible about? (God s old covenant/agreement/promise to Abraham and the people of Israel.) The promise was that He would be their leader and friend and would not leave them, but they had to obey certain laws (or rules) given to them by God. What is it called when we don t obey God? (Allow time for answers.) That s right; when we disobey God, we are sinning. What does the New Testament mean and what is it about? (The new covenant/promise/agreement between God and believers of Christ.) In the New Testament, the promise is that Jesus came to live a perfect life, die on the cross, and defeat death so that anyone who believes in Him will be in relationship with God again. The New Testament isn t about following rules and making things right between us and God through things we do, but about Jesus being the perfect and holy Lamb and paying the price for our sins so that we can be in relationship with God who is holy. In Matthew 5:17, Jesus says, I did not come to abolish the law of Moses or the writings of the prophets. No, I came to accomplish their purpose. And do you all remember what Romans 6:23 tells us is the payment for sin? For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord. Both of those verses speak to the new covenant or the new promise that God has made with His people. Have campers open their Bibles to the front. Spend some time explaining the Table of Contents and lists of the Books of the Bibles. Show them the Old Testament books of the Bible and the list of the New Testament books. There is also a list of all of the books together, in alphabetical order. Remind campers that the Bible is God s story it is one whole story of creation, salvation, redemption, and of Jesus return written out in 66 books. We are going to spend some time learning these books of the Bible and how to find them in our Bibles. And to help us do that now AND when you get home, I have a special Books of the Bible bookmark for each of you! Hand out a bookmark to each child, and then read through the books of the Old Testament a few times as a group. You can even go around the circle, having each child name the next book on the list (in the Bible or on the bookmark). If any camper thinks he or she can recite the books of the Old Testament, give him or her a try. Use the books of the Bible wall graphic on the wall as a reference point and guide if need be. Books of the Bible Word Search The purpose is for campers to learn and become more familiar with the books of both the Old and the New Testaments. Supplies: Word search poster for 1 st /2 nd graders (1 per session) Word search worksheet for 3 rd /4th graders (1 per camper) Note: 1 st /2 nd graders will do the activity as a class with the poster. 3 rd /4 th graders will do it as individuals with the worksheets. 1 st /2 nd : Hang the poster on the board. Explain to the class that when you say go, they are to find as Revised: 4/17 3
many Old Testament books in the word search as possible. Give them a few minutes to do so. Depending on class size and abilities, you can have them call out names of the books and you can circle it, or you could have campers come up to the front and circle a name at a time on their own. Call time! and flip the poster to the New Testament side and give them the same amount of time to find as many New Testament books as they can. Call time! and see how they did. 3 rd /4 th : Give each camper a word search worksheet. Don t let anyone start until you say go. Allow just a few minutes (up to you) for campers to find as many Old Testament books as possible. Call time! and have them flip over to the New Testament side. Give them the same amount of time to find as many New Testament books as they can. Call time! and see how they did. Tie It Together Talk to the campers about how they did. Explain to them that it s not important how quickly they are able to find books or passages in the Bible, but that as people who love God and want to know Him better, it is important we spend time reading His story. The more we know about the Bible and how and where to find things in it, the easier it will be and the better we ll be at spending time reading the Word of God. Find It The purpose is for campers to learn how Scripture passages are notated and how to find passages in the Bible. Supplies: Whiteboard How many of you know what a secret code is? (Allow time for answers.) Well, each passage in the Bible has a special combination of words and numbers that is kind of like a special code to help us find verses in the Bible except these codes aren t a secret! In fact, we re going to talk about how Bible passages are coded right now, so you ll know exactly how to look up things in your own Bible. It s almost like each verse has its own address. You already know a lot of the books of the Bible Genesis, Exodus, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and so on. That s the first thing to know when you want to look up something in the Bible. (Write Genesis on the board. Have campers turn to Genesis in their Bibles.) Each book of the Bible is divided into chapters and verses and each of those has a number. So, after you know the book name, you want to know the CHAPTER NUMBER. (Write chapter number 9 after the book on the board. Have campers turn to Genesis 9 in their Bibles.) And then you want to know what VERSE NUMBER (or NUMBERS) you are looking for. (Write verse number 12 after the chapter. Have campers turn to Genesis 9:12 and ask someone to read the verse. Teachers of younger classes, you may need to read the verse instead of having a camper do so.) Great job. Now if I was to write another verse code or verse reference on the board, do you think you could find it in the Bible on your own? Let s try. Let s look up 2 Timothy 3:16 (write the verse reference on the board as you say it out loud). Would Revised: 4/17 4
anyone like to read it for us? (Have a volunteer, teacher, or student helper read the verse.) Hey, it s your memory verse! Let s say it together a few times from memory. Now you know how to look up a Bible verse or passage if you re given the book name, the chapter, and the verse number. But what if you want to look up a verse about a certain thing that s important to you or something that is going on in your life? We ve talked about how helpful the Bible is in telling us more about God and more about how to live our lives. But if we have a question about something and don t know where it is in the Bible - how would we find it? (Some campers may actually know about the concordance, so allow time for them to answer, but many will not, so these may be rhetorical questions.) In the waaaay back of the Bible is something called a concordance. Can you say that with me? (CON-COR-DANCE.) Very good. A concordance is like a dictionary. Do any of you know what that is? (Allow time for answers.) It s a book that tells us what words mean. If you want to know more about something, you can look up the word in the dictionary/concordance and see where, in the Bible, that thing is mentioned. Maybe you want to know what God says about forgiveness, or angels, or baptism. All you have to do is find that word in the list of words in the dictionary/concordance, and you ll see the verse references to show you where in the Bible God talks about those things. It s important that you look at the verses before and after the one you look up to understand what the verse is saying. We need to be careful not to make up our own story to go with any given verse but to understand exactly what God is saying. Jesus himself related to us in stories (parables) not just with short phrases or a sentence or two. If it was important to Him to share about God in this way how much more important is it for us to study God s Word the same way? Ask your campers for topic suggestions and spend some time looking up a couple, teaching them to find the verses on that topic and showing them how to read the surrounding verses so we understand the story being told. God s Word speaks to every part of our lives. Learning to use the Bible can be hard, but it is important. We want to shape our lives around God s Word and we can only do that if we learn how to find what God has to say about what is going on in our lives and hearts. This can be really hard, even for adults, but God s Word is for each of us. Pastors, teachers, parents, and friends can be a great help to us, but God s Word has the power to change our lives and it is every believer s responsibility to study and know God s word. 2 Timothy 2:15 says, Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth. Make sure to encourage your campers and let them know that it s okay if it s hard for them to find something in the Bible. Let them know that it is still hard for us as adults but practice makes it easier Revised: 4/17 5
and God has a way of moving us in the right direction if we ll just try. Remind them that God has sent the Holy Spirit to help us know His word. Remind them of the John 14:26 from last week: John 14:26 says that the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. The Hands-On Bibles have some other helpful guides (most in the back). As time allows, show your campers some of these features and how they work. There will be Hands-On Bibles at your campus so encourage your campers to ask for one if they need one for home. Remind campers to use their new bookmarks to mark places in their Bibles at home, but also to help them learn the books of the Old and New Testaments. (If time allows, go over the memory verse with the campers again. Remind them of the beat you made up last week to help memorize the verse.) Gracechurchkids.org 2801 Pelham Rd. Greenville SC 29615 Ph: 864.284.0122 Fx: 864.284.0222 Revised: 4/17 6