If nothing else is accomplished through this “Children Who Know Their God” series, I would gladly spend the hours each week in prayer and writing (it literally does take hours to write a lesson) just so that the children in our ministry would move from knowing about God to actually knowing Him and having an intimate relationship with Him. Really, this series ought to be taught in the adult services, shouldn’t it!
This week, I want to share the next teaching segment taken from Daniel 11:32 and show you how that we taught the children that they can enter into a deeper relationship with God by reading His Word.
Week #6 Get to Know God Through His Word
Believe it or not, after 33 years of marriage, Vickie and I still have all of the love letters and cards that we wrote to each other during our last few weeks of high school and freshman and sophomore years of college. Reading these letters and cards reminds us of the depth of our love and the passion of our hearts at different times during our dating and courtship. The ink on those letters and cards related the intent of our hearts. It helped the other person to understand what we were feeling and thinking.
You can readily see how these letters and cards were used in the lesson to show God’s great love to us. His love letter, the Word, is the revelation of who He is and how He has wooed us. But sadly, most if not all of our children are not reading His love letter to us.
How can we change this? We need to eleminate their number one excuse for not reading the Word. I find that the children are ignoring God’s Word because they can’t understand what Mom and Dad’s Bible is saying. To erase this excuse, we showed a book that would be read to a 3-year-old, a book with one or two words per page and a lot of artwork. Next, we showed a book that would be used in Kindergarten or 1st grade with more words on the page and fewer pictures, a book like a Dr. Seuss book. It has a few more words per page and slightly fewer pictures. Next, we showed a book that would be read by a 3rd or 4th grader, a book like a Hardy Boys Mystery or a Dancy Drew Mystery. These books have far more words and only a few random pictures in the book. We explained that as the reader grows older, their ability to read and understand changes. This is also true for understanding God’s Word. There is a Bible available for any and every age group. To prove this point, we showed the See With Me Bible that is all pictures (used by little children) and then advanced to the International Children’s Story Bible which contained more words and then the Children’s Picture Bible and then The Action Bible and then the NIV Discoverer’s Bible. Through this natural progression, God’s love letter is easily read and understood.
Let me close this blog entry with an excerpt from a note that a mother posted on my Facebook page after that lesson was shared. “Pastor Billy, after church today **** asked us to take her to Family Christian to buy The Action Bible. She hates to read so we jumped at the chance. We were there when they opened at 12 & **** hasn’t put it down for the last 2 hours! Not even in the car ride home or at lunch! Thank u! God is good!”
In preparing and writing this lesson, I gave a subtitle which says “The Book Shows It ALL!” Psalms 119:169 tells us that His Word will help us to understand. Know His Book, Know Him! Know Him, Know Supernatural Strength and Exploits!
Next week, I’ll continue to share more on raising up a generation of children who will know God and do great things.
