God is Faithful BIBLE PASSAGE Joshua 1-6 (Jericho) REMEMBER VERSE God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline. 2 Timothy 1:7 SCHEDULE Celebrate & Respond Large Group 35 55 minutes Respond & Bless Small Group 20 25 minutes Environment: SERVING This lesson highlights the environment of SERVING by showing us how God gives His people the ability to be faithful servants who ask the question, What needs to be done? 1
Equipping Volunteers God is faithful. He proves this to His children again and again. Still, the first generation that left Egypt during the exodus had a hard time trusting God. They knew the promise God gave to their forefathers to take them to a land flowing with milk and honey, where they could live as a nation set apart for Him (Exodus 33:1 3). They also agreed to the covenant at Sinai, during which God gave His people the Ten Commandments and called them His treasured possession. The Israelites saw God s faithfulness when He rescued them from slavery in Egypt. They experienced His provision when He gave them food in the wilderness. Yet they continued to grumble and complain because they didn t truly trust Him. And though their spies discovered that the Promised Land was, indeed, a good land, they weren t excited, for they also heard the cities were full of powerful men (Numbers 13:26 29). Their fear blinded their trust that God would be faithful to His promise. Because of this, God said that no one in the first generation would enter the land (Deuteronomy 1:35 36). The next generation, though they also would grumble and complain, spent their entire lives depending on God to provide for their every need. When God asked them to do unconventional things, they followed His lead. Because God s Spirit was with them, the second generation crossed a flooded river, marched around the fortified city of Jericho, and overtook it. The second generation saw the land God had promised. God kept the promise He made to bring His people into a good land, and He proved to His people that He was and is always faithful. He only asked that they trust Him and follow His lead so He could transform them into faithful people who served Him with their whole hearts. Environment of SERVING This posture of the heart asks the question, What needs to be done? It allows the Holy Spirit to cultivate a sensitivity to others and focuses on a cause bigger than one individual life. It helps fulfill the mandate that as Christ-followers we re to view our lives as living sacrifices that we generously give away. The 10 environments give us ways to create a climate that puts God on display. Encourage your families to discover more about creating the environment of SERVING in their homes by checking out HomeFront: A Spiritual Parenting Resource and Spiritual Parenting by Michelle Anthony. 2
Celebrate// (Large Group) 20 35 min 1. Worship Through Music Open up your time together with singing! 1. I wanna be like Jesus 2. Radio the World 3. King of Majesty 2. Welcome & Traditions WELCOME VISITORS- Once everyone has arrived and you ve finished your music time, celebrate visitors! If they are a friend then have the regular attender who brought them introduce them to the group. Give all visitors a big round of applause for coming! And have a nearby leader give each visitor a high five AND a gumball (just for coming)!!! And how do we welcome new visitors to our group?! With a dance party! Play the dance party music for a minute and everyone just dance around and have fun :) (BUT- if no visitors, no celebration... motivation to bring your friends!) CONNECT- To finish up welcome time, let kids engage in today s connect question- our mini ice breaker to get everyone knowing each other a little better! Show Connect Slide for kids to view. Encourage them to ask someone they might not know yet. After a minute or two, ask several kids to tell their friends answers to the group- WHEN WAS THE FIRST TIME YOU WERE REALLY HOMESICK? WHERE WERE YOU? 3. Earning Gumballs! This year, we have a new community goal... Gumball Goal! Children earn 1 gumball for each of the following Know the Word- Memorizing this month s memory verse (NO mistakes for older kids!) Share the Word- Bringing a Friend Cling to the Word- Bringing their Bible Live the Word- Sharing a story of how they lived out what they are learning Give small groups 3-4 minutes to talk amongst themselves and earn their gumballs. They can go add their gumballs to the gumball machine. After a few minutes bring everyone s attention back together and make note of how we re seeing the gumball machine get filled week after week! What a representation of how, as a community, we are learning to KNOW the word, SHARE the word, CLING to the Word, and LIVE the word! AWESOME WORK!!! THIS MONTH... one additional way they can earn a gumball is by bringing a bag of candy to donate for this month s CandyFest event. This is a special event that we put on as a church for kids at the By the Hand who may not otherwise get to celebrate together during this season! 4. Remember Verse Introduce kids to this month s Remember Verse. Open your Bibles and read it together. When finished pass out Memory Verse cards to take home. Tell kids about the incentive for memorizing their verses... Colored tags of the verse they memorized! Earn all 12 this year and make a necklace, bracelet or keychain out of them! God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline. 2 Timothy 1:7 3
GLOBAL WEEK!!!!!! 5. Offering As a response of thankfulness and trust in God, we give a part of our money to the church to be utilized in big ways for the Kingdom! It is because we thank God for all that He has given to us, and because we trust Him to provide for us no matter how much or how little we may have. Pass around the Offering Bucket. Remind kids of how God is using our offering this year- to support your overseas sponsor child! Challenge your kids to continue to give out of what they have so that God might give it to your campus s sponsor child. 6. Prayer of Release Next, pray a Prayer of Release. This is a time for kids and leaders to pause, be still, and ask God to quiet their hearts and minds. Encourage kids to quiet their voices and take a seat. Then ask them to pray with you as you begin the lesson. 7. The Big God Story- God is Faithful SUPPLIES- Bible, Timeline Animation, Images, Audio Files SET UP- Cue the images and sound effect ENGAGE- Before you begin today s storytelling time, invite the kids to play a quick game of Follow the Leader. If you have a small group, form the kids into one line and have them follow the path and movements of the child in the front. After 30 seconds, change leaders. If you have a large group, invite three children onstage. Play upbeat music and invite the kids to follow the dance moves of one child onstage for 30 seconds. Then invite them to follow the dance moves of the next child, and so on. We just played a fun game of Follow the Leader. Today we re going to hear about how the Israelites followed the leader God had chosen for them Joshua into the Promised Land. But first let s remember what we ve already discovered. For the past couple of weeks we ve seen how the Israelites traveled through the wilderness on their way to the Promised Land. We heard about how they sent spies ahead to see the land, and these spies reported that the land was great! But lots of big, strong men lived there. This made the Israelites afraid. They didn t want to face these huge men, even though God promised to be with them. Because the Israelites didn t trust God, He didn t allow that generation to enter the Promised Land. God is always faithful to His promises, and He requires faith from His children. What does it mean to be faithful? (Encourage kids to answer.) To be faithful means you are loyal and committed to someone or something, no matter the cost. God is faithful to us. And He is looking for faithful people who trust Him with their lives. God gives us this kind of faith through the power of His Holy Spirit. This kind of faith makes us into people whose hearts want what God wants. It makes us into people who desire to serve God and others. God gives us this kind of faith and the ability to ask this question: What needs to be done to serve God and His people? The older generation of Israelites didn t have a faith that allowed them to trust God to take care of them. Because of this, God kept the people in the wilderness for 40 years. As they wandered, the older, unfaithful generation died. Then, when the time came, God led the new generation into the Promised Land (Joshua 1:1 3). This new generation was led by a man named Joshua. God spoke to Joshua and told him to get the people ready to cross the Jordan River and enter the Promised Land. God said, Be strong and courageous, because you will lead these people to inherit the land I swore to give them (v. 6). So the Israelites gathered all of their things and got ready to cross the river. At this time of year, the Jordan River was at its flood stage, meaning the water was very, very high, and some think it may have been a mile wide! On their own, the Israelites might not have been able to cross it. But, just as God had parted the Red Sea years ago, He was faithful to part the water of the Jordan River so the people could cross it safely. 4
The priests were the first to cross. They carried the ark of the covenant (show image of ark). The ark of the covenant was the symbol of God s presence with them. It was very holy, and no one could touch it. As the priests carried the ark across the river, the water parted, creating a wall of water (show image of parted Jordan River) that the people would walk past. About a million Israelites crossed the river into the Promised Land that day! They d made it! The Israelites had crossed the river and reached the Promised Land! But there was still more to be done. God told His people He would help them defeat those living in the land. And the first city God told them to defeat was Jericho a very strong city with a wall that wrapped all the way around it (show image of Jericho). The Israelites probably felt afraid and felt small next to Jericho s mighty walls. But God told Joshua, I have delivered Jericho into your hands (Joshua 6:2). And God would win the battle for His people. God gave the people specific instructions about how they would defeat the city. (Encourage the kids to open their Bibles and follow along in Joshua 6:3 5, and act out this next part as you share it.) God said, March around the city once with all the armed men. Do this for six days. Have seven priests carry trumpets of rams horns in front of the ark. On the seventh day, march around the city seven times, with the priests blowing the trumpets. When you hear them sound a long blast on the trumpets, have all the people give a loud shout; then the wall of the city will collapse and the people will go up, every man straight in (vv. 3 5). How do you think people usually fight battles? (Encourage kids to answer.) Do battles involve marching around a city and blowing trumpets? This definitely wasn t the military strategy the Israelites would have thought of themselves. In fact, it wasn t a military strategy at all! But Joshua and the Israelites trusted that God would use them to serve Him by bringing them into the land as He had promised. So they did exactly what God said. Let s imagine what this would be like. (Play marching music. If you want, march seven times around the room as you storytell. Optional: Have the kids play their trumpets from ANTICIPATE.) After the Israelites had marched around the city seven times, they all gave a great shout! (Have the kids shout as loud as they can.) Then guess what happened? The walls all came down, and the army marched straight into Jericho. God had been faithful! God had defeated the city for His people! (Encourage the kids to cheer.) God faithfully fulfilled the promise He had made to the Israelites ancestors to bring the people into the Promised Land. But God wasn t in a hurry. He waited for a generation that would be faithful. Though the generation that entered the Promised Land wasn t perfect, God led them to be the kind of people who ask, What needs to be done to serve God and His people? God led them to serve Him by trusting Him and following His lead as He took care of them. Today God calls us to have the same kind of faith. When Jesus was on earth, He spoke of the day when He would return. And when He returns, He ll look for people with faith (Luke 18:8) people who ask the question, What needs to be done to serve God and others? But here s the good news: We don t have to try harder to be faithful servants on our own. God gives us the ability to live out this kind of faith through the power of the Holy Spirit. Part of living out our faith means looking around the world and asking God, Lord, what needs to be done? And not only listening to what He tells us, but having a willing heart to actually go and do the things He calls us to do. God is faithful to us, always. And He calls us to be faithful to Him. Driving Out the Nations God commanded His people to drive out the people who lived in the land because they were immoral and spiritually bankrupt. We can read God s command to drive out the people from the Promised Land in Deuteronomy 7:1 6, 16. God did this because He knew these pagan people would tempt His people s hearts away from Him, the one true God. (Because the Hebrews didn t annihilate everyone in the land, we see that this became true: The foreign nations eventually pulled God s people away from worshipping Him only.) This is the spiritual reason for God s command. As a cultural reason, one scholar asserts that this command to destroy these foreign nations would not have been 5
strange to the ears of the Hebrews. It was a common practice in the nations of the ancient near East to annihilate those in nearby lands in dedication to a deity and in order to protect themselves. As human beings with limited perspectives, we will not be able to understand everything God does. What we do know, however, is that we can trust what we know about God s character. We know that He is a loving, trustworthy God who holds an eternal perspective. He will bring about what will give Himself the most glory and be for our best interests. God is good, and we can trust Him! 8. Walls SUPPLIES- wooden cubes, permanent markers SET UP- pass out the wooden cubes so that each child gets one, and have leaders ready to hand out permanent markers when children are ready to write (younger kids will need help writing) ENGAGE- The new generation of Israelites entered the Promised Land and received what God had promised them. God gave it to them because they chose to be a faithful generation who trusted Him with their whole hearts and allowed Him to make them into people who served Him. God still calls us to be a faithful generation. When Jesus returns to the earth, the Bible says He ll be looking for people with faith (Luke 18:8). Do you think He will find that kind of faith on earth? Will He find faith in you? (Allow the kids to ponder this question for a moment.) The older generation had something very big that harmed their ability to have faith that God would take care of them. That was fear. All of us have things that make us afraid things that can get in the way of our ability to trust in God s faithfulness. Spend a few minutes in prayer, and ask God to reveal to you some of the things that might be holding you back from completely trusting Him. (Give the kids some time to pray quietly.) You ve each been given a wooden block, and the leaders have permanent markers for you to use when you re ready. Pray for a few minutes, talk with God- ask Him to reveal to you what is one thing getting in the way of you trusting Him completely. When you re ready write that one thing down on your block. It could be many things: fear, worry, hard situations in life, etc. Once you write those down, bring your block to the front of the room, and help each other stack the blocks to build a wall. Note: if your campus is small and your wall will be too small to knock down then fill in with some extra blank blocks as well so it s a little bigger. (After the kids have had some time to write on their blocks, share:) This represents the wall that s blocking our faith. On the count of three, just like the Israelites did in Jericho, we re going to knock the wall down and shout as loud as we can. Just as God defeated Jericho, God can defeat anything that hinders us in our faith! Have one child volunteer come up and on the count of 3 have the kids shout GOD IS FAITHFUL!!! as loud as they can, while your child volunteer knocks the wall down. Then clap and celebrate that you are working together to strengthen your faith and trust in God, and getting rid of the road blocks stopping us. **If children want to take their cube with them as a reminder, or something to hold while praying and asking God for release from it, then they may come up and find their block to take home. 6
Respond// (Small Group) 15 20 min. 1. Reflect: God waited for a whole new generation to be ready before He brought His people into the Promised Land. This new generation trusted in God s faithfulness and was willing to do whatever He asked them to do. Because of this, God brought them through the Jordan River and into the city of Jericho. (Leaders: Encourage the kids to open their Bibles and read the referenced passages.) Questions for Younger Kids What is faith? (Hebrews 11:1) How did the Israelites know God would one day give them the Promised Land? (Genesis 15:7) Why did God wait to send His people into the Promised Land? (Deuteronomy 1:32 36) What do you think it looked like to see God stopping the flow of the Jordan River? (Joshua 3:14 17) What do you think the Israelites thought when God told them to march around the city? (Joshua 6:2 5) How do you know God will always be faithful to keep His promises to us today? Is there something in your life right now that helps you rely on God s faithfulness? How have you seen God s faithfulness in your life? How does God help us to be faithful servants? What needs to be done to serve God and others in our own lives? Questions for Older Kids What is faith? What does it mean to be faithful? (Hebrews 11:1, 6) How do you know God is always faithful? How did the Israelites know God would one day give them the Promised Land? (Genesis 15:7) Why wasn t the older generation allowed to enter the Promised Land? (Deuteronomy 1:32 35) What do you think it looked like to see God stopping the flow of the Jordan River? (Joshua 3:14 17) What do you think the Israelites thought when God told them to march around the city? (Joshua 6:2 5) Has there ever been a time when you found it hard to trust God s faithfulness? Is there something in your life right now that makes you need to rely upon God s faithfulness? How have you seen God s faithfulness in your life or the lives of people around you? How does God help us to be faithful servants? What needs to be done to serve God and others in our own lives? 2. Create: Praying for the Nations SUPPLIES- prayer wall map, half of a posterboard per group ENGAGE God had promised this one, very significant piece of land to the Israelites for a long time. But we know that later on Scripture, Jesus reminds them that they were not to just stay there and reap the rewards for themselves... they were to leave the promised land and Go. Make disciples of all nations. God brought them to this place so that He could bless them with this land. BUT ALSO so that He could use them in this new place. They would see many people cross through this land from all of the nations around them. Point out the central location of Israel on the map. With faith they needed to learn to enter the promised land and to trust God. And with faith they needed to learn to leave the promised land and to trust God to use them everywhere! 7
We need to do the same thing! God has abundantly blessed us by sharing with us the truth of His Son. This is our promised land- to know Jesus closely. And so in the same way, we need to trust God to use us with others. To share the truth of God s promises, specifically God s promise through His Son, Jesus. Next week, we are going to hear about some things God is doing around the world, and about some people in other nations who need to hear about God. Let s practice as a group what we would share with others about God. Brainstorm truth statements as a group that you would share with someone about Jesus. What is true about Jesus that we can share with others? Then talk about when you could share these things with people right around us (for example: my brother doesn t know about Jesus, my friend on my soccer team, when my friend comes over to play who doesn t go to church). For fun, and to keep the focus on the nations, ask the kids if they could go ANYWHERE in the world to tell someone about Jesus, where would they go? Send the kids home with a map of the world. Tell them to circle the place they would go and share about Jesus. Help each child write on their map- Go, Make Disciples. 3. Bless: SETUP AND ENGAGE- Encourage the kids to hold their hands in front of them, palms up. This posture is meant to symbolize a willingness of heart to respond to God s Holy Spirit and receive what God has for them. Open a Bible and read Psalm 99:5 (NLT): Exalt the Lord our God! Bow low before his feet, for he is holy! May God s Holy Spirit give you a heart that is inspired to worship Him! May God strengthen your heart and your faith so that you cannot help but worship Him in all that you do. HomeFront Weekly: Be sure to send home the HomeFront Weekly for next week s lesson! This preteaching tool for parents encourages families to spend time in God s Word together before children arrive at church. 8