LESSON 4: LISTEN AND OBEY AND ON SOLID GROUND YOU LL STAY! Teacher & Co-Teacher using Watch & Train DVD Watching the Bible Story and Skit on DVD Purpose Statement: This Skit and Bible Story will teach the children that it is not enough just to listen to God s instructions, warnings and commands. We have to obey as well. Materials/Props Needed: Lesson 4 DVD materials, several chairs, 1 CD player or MP3 player, 1 music CD. 1 Lead the children through the opening activity Bob N Rob. Begin Worship Time. 1 Logo Note: For this lesson use Sound Track CD # 1. # 1 TeacHER (CD Track # 1) Welcome, all my traveling friends, welcome to Normal City, the most normal city on the face of the earth. It s the place where people talk normal, act normal and even dress normal. Really?! Oh, wow that s a relief. I was scared it was going to be that crazy Upsidedown Town again where the people talk in rhyme, wear goofy clothes, and act really strange. But Normal City? That sounds great! Gotcha! Huh? Why would we go to someplace as boring sounding as Normal City? We re back in Upsidedown Town again! Oh no. Oh yes! And it s time for our opening song! Get out of those seats and on to your feet, everyone! 2 Opening Song 2 Teacher and Co-Teacher lead the children in singing the song. 1 2009 Fellowship Church
(CONT D) It looks like everybody is really starting to get good at that song! Great job, everyone! Yeah, and now that we ve done the song, I m betting we ll do some sort of crazy game next where nothing works because it s upside down. What? Oh, you know...the game...with the upside down stuff... Hmmm...no, not ringing any bells. Seriously?! The upside down game where it doesn t work and we have to play it again the right way! I m sorry, my friend, I don t know what you re talking about. 3 (sighs) Unless you re talking about the Upside Down Challenge, of course! I need some volunteers! 3 Upside Down Challenge The next section of the lesson is a round of musical chairs. Gather your volunteers and set up the chairs in a circle. Make sure you have one less chair than you have volunteers. Play music and have the volunteers walk around the chairs. When the music stops, the volunteers will scramble to get in a chair. The one who is left without a chair is eliminated. One chair is removed and the game continues until there is only one chair and two volunteers. However, after a couple of rounds, have the chairs upside down on the ground. Try to play a round and when it doesn t work, start over with the chairs right side up and play a full game or two. After the game the Teacher will wrap up the activity using the following lines. (CONT D) Now that was an intense round of musical chairs! Now let me ask you something. Did it work when the chairs were upside down? (allows the children to answer) 2 2009 Fellowship Church
You know that it didn t work. It was crazy! Chairs aren t made to be sat in when they re upside down! Yes! That s right. Things don t work out very well when they are upside down. That s the point of this entire series. When we don t live life the way God wants, we are living upside down. And if we pay attention while we are in Upsidedown Town, we can learn the right way to live. Today we re talking about listening to warnings and instruction and then obeying. It isn t enough just to hear instruction, we have to follow those instructions as well. Let me guess...so we ll understand this idea...you want us to see what the opposite looks like. You want us to watch a person who hears instructions but then doesn t follow them. 4 Skit Intro 4 5 You re getting pretty good at this. Let s take a moment to meet Frida Van Meed. Note: Play Skit Video chapter # 4 followed by Race Video chapter # 5. 5 Race Video Co- Okay...hold on...we ve seen some characters who were misguided and a couple who were just confused...but that one made absolutely no sense at all. She knew what was going to happen, she read all the warnings, and even passed them on to other people. But she fell victim in every single situation. I can t even wrap my mind around this one! 6 Well, yes, that was very strange behavior. It doesn t make sense to hear instructions or receive a warning and then not obey. But we are guilty of that when we hear instruction, warnings and even commands in the Bible and don t follow them. It isn t enough for us just to come to church and hear these lessons. It also isn t enough to just read our Bibles. We need to take all that instruction and put it into practice. If the Bible says to do something, then we should do it. And if the Bible tells us not to do something then you d better believe that we shouldn t do it! We have to listen and obey. We have to do both. And that s why we re going to use this idea as our Main Point: Listen And Obey And On Solid Ground You ll Stay! And you know we have to shout this with motions, so everybody up! 6 Main Point The Teacher leads the children by first demonstrating the Main Point with motions. These motions should be similar to cheerleader-type hand motions. The Teacher can make up the 3 2009 Fellowship Church
motions or have the children help come up with them. Once everyone has gone over the Main Point have the children repeat it with motions two or three times. Ow, my ears...speaking of warnings, you could have warned me that it was going to be that loud. Sorry. But I had to make sure that it was loud enough for all of us to remember. We have to listen and obey. Because it if we just listen and then don t obey, we ll end up just like Frida Van Meed. And she was just plain crazy. Well, it is Upsidedown Town. We ve seen the example of upside down living, now we need to see what right side up looks like. We need to learn more about listening and obeying. And for that we need to open up our Bibles to Matthew, chapter 7, starting in verse 24. Listen to this. Allow children time to look up the Bible story before starting. You may need to help younger children find the Bible reference. 7 Bible Story Intro 7 Note: Play Bible Story Video chapter # 7. So if we listen and don t obey, we re like someone who builds a house on sand. 8 Yes, basically Jesus was saying that to listen and not obey means that we re heading for disaster. God didn t give us His Word, the Bible, so we would just leave it on a shelf. He didn t give us the Bible so we would read it and then forget about what we d read. He gave us His Word to help us. But it can only help us if we listen and obey. And speaking of being helped by the Bible, here s a Bible Verse that really helps me. Check it out: 8 Bible Verse James 1:22 But don t just listen to God s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves. NLT See? It isn t enough to just listen. The Bible is full of wise instruction, warnings and commandments all designed to help us have the best life possible. But it won t do us any good unless we put it into practice. God blessed us in an amazing way when He gave us His Word. He could have just left us alone to figure life out 4 2009 Fellowship Church
9 # 1 10 11 12 # 4 by ourselves, but He didn t do that because He loves us. Let s all worship Him and thank Him for His love. Everybody up. Teacher and Co-Teacher lead the children in singing the song. (CD Track # 1) Thank you for worshiping with us. We re going to continue learning about following God s instruction and obeying warnings in our Small Groups. (10) Note: If you are staying in your room, transition to the Small Group activities by reviewing the Main Point. You can have the children say it fast, slow, while hoping on one foot, or even while walking around the room. Challenge them to get back to their seats before you can finish reciting the Main Point. If your Small Group(s) travel to a second room or location, have the children repeat the Main Point while walking in various ways. Ex: Marching, skipping, crawling, walking backwards, pretending to fly, etc. SMALL GROUPS Note: The offering time can take place in either the Large Group time or the Small Group time. If you take up the offering during your Small Group, then skip the next section of the Large Group script. OFFERING (CD Track # 4) Now that we re finished with our Small Groups, I want us to continue to worship God with our offering. This is another important way to worship God. We give back to Him a portion of what He has given us. This is our way of saying thanks and showing that we trust God to provide for us. Let s pray. Lead the children in prayer. If you want to, include elements of the lesson you are teaching today. For instance, today we are talking about listening to God s instructions and obeying Him. So you might say, Dear God, thank You for giving us the Bible. Help us to make time to read Your Word every day and put Your instructions into practice. Amen. Take up the offering. Thank you for worshiping with us. (to Teacher) So what needs to happen before we can leave Upsidedown Town and head somewhere more normal? Not much, my friend. There s just the simple matter of our 9 10 11 Song Small Group Logo MP Still 12 Offering 5 2009 Fellowship Church
13 review game! It s time for Milton McGoo s Upsidedown Town Review! Answer these questions and show us what you ve Review Game learned. Note: Lead the children through the questions. Hit play when a child has given you the right answer. CLOSING 13 # 1 (CD Track # 1) Whew...and now back to a world that makes sense. Until next time, of course. Yeah...I know. TeACHER Great job, everyone! Don t forget what we learned about here in Upsidedown Town today: Listen And Obey And On Solid Ground You ll Stay! We ll see you back here next time! 6 2009 Fellowship Church