BIG IDEA: Jesus birth brought great joy for all the people. QUESTION: How did Jesus birth bring joy to people? ANSWER: Jesus birth proved that God is with us and He never stopped loving us. We love hearing good news, especially when we re the first to know. There s a big difference between getting a phone call from your best friend about their pregnancy, engagement or new job and finding out about it on Facebook. We cherish being invited to participate in the lives of the people we love instead of simply being spectators. Today, the ability to share exciting news with others is quick and easy. With one tweet, post, hashtag or group text, we can communicate with the masses. But things were obviously very different in the time Jesus was born. When something important happened, such as the birth of a child, heralds often spread that news. Families welcoming new babies, if they had the means to do so, would hire someone to go throughout the community and announce their happy news. Mary and Joseph, of humble means, did not have the ability to do this. But God Himself provided a company of heavenly heralds to proclaim the birth of His one and only Son. Imagine the scene: shepherds on the midnight watch, ears and eyes open for signs of danger, sheep bleating in the background. And then, out of nowhere, an angel of the Lord bursts onto the scene with the news of the Savior s birth. It is amazing that God chose this group of men as the first to hear the good news. In the time of Jesus birth, people regarded shepherds as liars and thieves. Because they were nomadic, moving from place to place to graze their flocks, people didn t readily trust them. Yet it was to men such as this that God announced the Messiah s coming. He told them first! Not royalty, not the religious leaders of the day, but shepherds lowly and insignificant. He invited them into His story and then mobilized them as the very first evangelists. As soon as they heard news of Jesus birth, the shepherds felt compelled to act. They went with haste, leaving their flocks behind, to find Mary, Joseph and the Savior Child lying in a manger. And once they beheld the One through whom salvation would come, they spread the word of all that had taken place. We are like these men unlikely recipients of an unbelievable reality. Just as God called the shepherds to witness and testify to Christ s birth, so we are called to herald the saving work of His death and resurrection. As believers, we have been invited into His story, sent out as heralds of both Jesus first coming and His second. As we consider the shepherds, let us respond as they did to this good news of great joy with amazement, belief and action.
Before kids arrive, pray for each regular attendee by name. Pray for those who might visit your group for the first time. Pray that your kids would not just hear the story of God sending Jesus, but that they would understand the depth and importance of His Son being given to us. Thank God for sending His Son to earth! Thank God for loving us enough to develop a rescue plan to save us! Thank God for giving us a reason to have joy, no matter what we face! Ask God that the children would be full of joy today and this week because of the great news they heard today! Supplies: 3 Ring It! games Game Description Clap and ring your way to victory! Players continuously flip their cards until a combo is found. Be the first to find the combo, clap your hands and ring the bell. Hesitation may cost you first place, but if you act too quickly you may make a mistake and face a penalty! Get ready for chaotic clapping followed by lots of laughter! Ring It! is for 2 to 9 players, ages 5 and up. Play Time: 15 minutes. Includes 90 cards, bell and illustrated rules. Skills involved include visual perception, focus & attention and processing speed. Please make sure that game pieces are not mixed up between the sets and that all of them are placed back into the original tin box. During the game, take time to chat with students. You can ask: What are you most excited about the upcoming week? What is your favorite thing about Christmas and why? What s your favorite family Christmas tradition and why? What is your favorite Christmas song? What do you like to do when you are on Christmas break from school? Have you ever heard really exciting news that you wanted to tell everyone? Later in the lesson you might want to mention this game as an illustration of expectation, waiting and looking, and tie it that since the promise God made to Adam and Eve. Through thousands of years that followed, people were looking forward to the arrival of the promised child who will crush the serpent s head.
Supplies: Occupations flash cards in a small paper bag, Gather kids in a circle around the paper bag. One by one, have kids draw out an occupation flash card and act it out for everyone else to guess. Give everyone 60 seconds for their act (no words or sound are allowed.) Keep the Shepherd card separately. After everyone had a chance to act out their occupation, ask everyone to look a you and guess what occupation you re trying to portray. Ask children to tell you what they know about shepherds what their job is like and what role they played in the Christmas story. Say: Shepherds kept sheep together and kept them safe from wild animals. The night Jesus was born, a group of shepherds were in a nearby field, watching over their sheep. In those days, shepherds were considered second rate. No one was concerned about what was happening in the fields. No one was thinking about the shepherds or the sheep. They were stinky! Honestly, no one really cared about the shepherds at all except God. Can you imagine being the shepherds? You re minding your own business and hanging out with your sheep buds when all of a sudden the sky lights up and is full of angels singing praises to God. Shepherds were the very first people to hear about the birth of Jesus. God could have chosen anyone to be the first to hear about Jesus. He could have told the rich and famous. He could have sent an angel to Caesar. God could have told the high priest. But God chose shepherds to hear the message first. Shepherds were considered nobodies. They were looked down on. They were expendable. No one would choose to give shepherds such an important message. But God did. And they took that message and took to the streets to make sure that everyone in Bethlehem heard that Jesus the promised Savior of the world was finally here! Why do you think it s important that the first people who heard about the birth of Jesus were humble shepherds? Remember, shepherds were not important people; they were nobodies. Allow answers. God chose those no one else would choose to do something great. By sending the angels to the shepherds, God showed to us that the good news about His love isn t reserved for just the cool kids and the powerful, rich people. His love is for everyone. No matter who you are or what you ve done, God s love is for you. God doesn t play favorites. His grace, forgiveness, and love are available to everyone. He wants everyone to come to know Him and be a part of His family. I m glad that God chose to use the shepherds to demonstrate that God s love is for everyone. Sometimes I don t feel like God s love is for me. Have you ever felt that way like maybe you aren t good enough for God s love? It s important to remember that God s love is for everyone that includes you and that includes me. That s not because anything we have done, but because of who God is. God includes us because He chooses to because He loves us no matter what. Supplies: blindfold, Superbook The First Christmas (full version 22 min. or condensed 9 min.), Humble King video (15 min. 43 sec.) Explain that a little later today they re going to be learning about shepherds and the role they played in the Christmas story. To honor them, you re going to play a version of Blind Man s Bluff involving one person being a blind shepherd and the rest of the class being the sheep that the shepherd has to tag. Pick one person to be the Blind Shepherd. Place a blindfold over their eyes. Instruct the sheep that they have to say, Baa! whenever the shepherd yells, Sheep! They also have to move around on the ground like sheep do. Once a sheep is tagged, he or she becomes the shepherd. Say: This is just a fun game, but it gives us a little glimpse at what life is like for a shepherd. They have to keep a close watch on their sheep so the sheep don t baa their way into danger. This reminds me how God is like a shepherd, and He came into our world to look for His lost sheep us. Play one of the videos.
Supplies: a wrapped up gift (bag of candy), Left, Right, and Across script (see the last page) Circle up your group and explain that you will read a version of today s Bible story as they pass the gift around the circle. Explain that you will be reading a story and they will be passing the gift continuously in one direction or another. If you say the word right they must pass the gift to the right. If you say left, they must change directions and pass the gift to the left. If you say across, whoever is holding the gift must pass it to someone across the circle from them. Inform the group that whoever is holding the gift when you say, The end, gets to keep what s inside. Stand just to the outside of the circle, and ask the kids to begin passing the gift to the left as you begin reading the story from the script. Watch to make sure the kids move the gift according to the directional words you say from the story. After the game say: You are GREAT listeners! (To the kid holding the gift bag/box.) Hold onto that for just a second, but DON T open it, okay? I LOVE this story. Can you imagine how those shepherds must have felt, out in the field, tending to their folks when an entire angel choir showed up across the sky with LIFE-changing news? Wow! What a moment. What joy they must have felt. But the best part of this story is that God chose to announce the birth of His only Son Jesus to a bunch of smelly, humble, regular, everyday shepherds and not to a king or warrior or a wealthy guy with a bunch of land or someone in any kind of position of power. The story of Jesus is for everyone! Speaking of that, (to the person holding the present) why don t you open the gift to see what s inside? (Once the gift is revealed) So this gift isn t just for one person; it s for everyone! Everybody gets a prize. Pass the candy around. This gift was for everyone! But the gift of Jesus is EVEN better! What a reason to have joy. Supplies: print paper, pencils Give each kid a piece of paper and ask them to fold it in half twice. When they open it back up, they ll have four equal sections. At the top of each section, have them write the following titles: Family, School, Neighborhood, and Sports Team or Activity (they can write the name of the sport, like baseball, or the activity, like ballet.) Set a timer for five minutes. Challenge the kids to write down the names of everyone they know in each of these categories. Make this activity personal by creating your own list (you may want to change School to Work ; Activity to Hobby etc.), as the kids are creating theirs. Explain that this piece of paper represents their oikos a group of people where God has strategically placed each child to help them come closer to Jesus. Pass out Christmas comic books Challenge the kids to choose one person on the list that they could give this comic book to. Say: God sent the angels to those shepherds to announce Jesus birth because this amazing news was for everyone. JESUS is for everyone. God wants every single person He s created to experience His love and know that Jesus came to save everyone. So my challenge to you this Christmas week is to choose someone on your list and give them this comic book. If possible, tell them about Christmas and why you celebrate Jesus birth. Select someone from your own list that hasn't accepted Jesus. Briefly explain how you know this person to the kids. Ask the kids to pray that you would be bold enough to invite this person to church and talk to him about what you believe or figure out some way that you could begin a conversation about Jesus. Give the kids a few moments to pray that God would help them give their comic books away to the person they ve chosen. Pray at the end, asking God to help you and the kids to share His story of Jesus with the people around you. Dear God, thank You SO much for sending Jesus for everyone! Help us to share this story so that the people on our list can experience the love only YOU can give. Help us to share the message of Christmas this week! We love You. In Jesus name, amen. Encourage the kids to show their comic books to their parents or guardians and let them know who they are for.
Supplies: Shepherd Masks, markers, crayons, Bible Set out the markers/crayons then give each kid a Shepherd Mask. Ask everyone to color their masks as you read today s story passage from Luke 2:8-20. As they listen, tell the kids to picture themselves as one of the shepherds on the hillside the night Jesus was born and think about what it would have been like. When you re done reading, have everyone stop coloring or quickly finish up. Next, let the kids take turns answering each of the questions below. When it s their time to speak, have them hold the mask tightly to their face so that their lips show through the open area of the mask and look like the mouth of their shepherd. Tell me what it was like to see the sky filled with angels. What were you most afraid of when the angels appeared? What surprised you the most about the angel s announcement to you and your shepherd friends? Of all the things that happened that night on the hillside, what was the most exciting part for you? How did it make you feel to be the first ones to hear the news of the Savior s birth? If time allows, allow kids to come up with their own questions they would ask the shepherds. Let them ask those questions to each other. Say: Apart from an occasional runaway lamb or a sheep thief, a Bethlehem shepherd s life wasn t too exciting... until the night when Christ was born. Suddenly, instead of having nothing very exciting to tell their friends and family, they now had the most important news of all time. God didn t announce Jesus birth to kings or famous people. He sent an angel choir to announce this news to a bunch of poor shepherds on a hillside. None of us are Bethlehem shepherds although you guys did a great job wearing a mask and acting the part but we do have the same amazing message to share: Jesus, the Savior, has come and He wants people everywhere to believe in Him. If we believe that Jesus is the Promised One sent from God to rescue us from our sins, we have the greatest news ever. It s news we can t keep to ourselves. We need to share it with everyone. And TODAY is the perfect day to do that! Supplies: Candy Cane poster or real candy Say: How many of you have already decorated your house for Christmas? Raise your hand, if your tree has at last one candy cane hanging on it. Wait for response. Candy canes come in all colors and flavors these days. You can get candy canes in red, yellow, orange, purple, green, pink, and blue. You can get candy canes that taste like Lifesavers, SweetTarts, Spree, Starburst, and Jelly Bellys. You can get candy canes decorated with Dora, Scooby Doo, Spongebob, and even Star Wars Characters. But regardless what color and what flavor candy cane you prefer, a candy cane just isn t a candy cane if it doesn t have that familiar candy cane shape. The shape of a candy cane has a practical purpose. The hook on top of the candy cane allows us to hang candy canes on Christmas trees. But there s a symbolic purpose to the shape of the candy cane as well. It resembles a pause to let the students guess... shepherd s crook, making the candy cane a good reminder of the only visitors Mary, Joseph, and Jesus had the night Jesus was born. When Jesus, God s only son, came to save the world from sin, whom did God invite to see baby Jesus? A couple of shepherds. These were not educated men. They weren t rich, and they certainly weren t famous. They were common laborers working the night shift at a low paying job. They were sleepy, dirty, and a little smelly. So why would God want these lowly shepherds to see His son? To show us that Jesus came for everyone. He didn t come just for the rich, the famous, the powerful, or the elite. He came for shepherds, for tax collectors, for the poor, for the sick, and for the downtrodden. //Continued on the next page
When God invited the shepherds to witness Jesus birth, he invited everyone to come see the manger. Not only did God want us to know we are invited, he wanted us to understand that everyone is invited. As God s people, we need to welcome everyone to the manger. We need to share baby Jesus with friends, with classmates, and with the outcasts. We need to share God s love with the sick, the elderly, the homeless, and the poor.jesus wasn t born in a palace, set apart from the people. He wasn t even born in a proper bed. He was born in a stable, and his first visitors were shepherds - men who carried the shepherd s crook. God made it very clear right from the beginning that Jesus was someone that anyone, even a lowly shepherd, could come and see.as Christmas approaches this year, let s look at the candy cane and remember the message of the shepherds. Let s thank God for his love. Let s thank him for welcoming everyone to the manger. And let s open our hearts to welcome anyone willing to come and see baby Jesus. There were shepherds were RIGHT out in the field nearby, taking care of their sheep at night. An angel appeared to them. And the glory of the Lord shone bright ACROSS the sky. And they were terrified. But the angel probably said, Do not be frightened. I bring good news. It will bring great joy to everyone. Today, RIGHT here, in the town of David, a Savior has been born to you. You will find a baby wrapped in strips of cloth and lying in a manger. Suddenly, a large group of angels from heaven also appeared ACROSS the night sky. They were praising God and saying, May glory be given to God in the highest heaven! And may peace be given to those he is pleased with on earth!" The angels LEFT and went to heaven. Then, the shepherds said to one another, Let s go RIGHT to Bethlehem. Let s see this thing which has happened that the Lord has told us about. So they LEFT the sheep behind and hurried off RIGHT away and found Mary, Joseph, and the baby lying in the manger. After the shepherds had seen the baby, they LEFT to tell everyone. But Mary treasured these things in her heart. The shepherds returned, RIGHT back to their sheep. They gave glory to God. Everything they had seen and heard was just as they had been told. The end!