Talking about God with Your Kids
Parents,
We know the rhythms of your days may look different than they have in the past. We hope that you’ll use this time together to draw your child’s focus to the foundational truths of Scripture and the character of God. In Redemption Kids we just finished Unit 1 called “What is God like?”.
Each week we’ve talked about things that make God who He is. We believe that building a child’s fundamental thoughts about who God is will shape them and serve them well in the long term. We want you to know that we don’t just want kids ten years from now who can only articulate verses or remember details from Bible stories. We want kids who know what God is like, who He is, and the implications of those things. We believe in shaping little hearts and minds that aren’t just learning about God, but who are already starting to internalize the truth of who He is.
Below is an outline of the past 8 weeks in Redemption Kids. Parents, you can read the passages (called “Text” each week) and talk about what God is like in each passage.
Unit 1 What is God like?
Verse: Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how untraceable his ways! -Romans 11:33 (ESV)
Week 1 God is holy
*Ask: ‘what is God like?’ Answer: ‘God is holy’
*Define ‘holy’: set apart in the most wonderfully unique way; must be separate from Sin.
*Establish – Most important thing in life – to Know Who God is.
*Text: Moses and burning bush Exodus 3:14 “I AM” –
* Wrap up:
Knowing who God is is most important thing in life.
Because of Jesus’, we don’t have to separate from a Holy God.
Week 2 God is forgiving
*Ask: ‘what is God like?’ Answer: ‘God is holy and God is forgiving.’
*Introduce terms: sin, fallenness
*Text:
God’s directions: Genesis 2.15-17a
Human response: Genesis 3.1-7 (sin)
Curse: Genesis 3.14-19 (fallenness)
God establishes plan to forgive our fallenness: Genesis 3.15 and 21
One will come to defeat Satan and God kills an animal and uses it to cover them. He’s beginning His story of how he will forgive us for our fallenness.
Week 3 God knows all
*Ask: ‘what is God like?’ Answer: God is holy, forgiving, and God knows all things
Note: You are not trying to teach a story or passage of Scripture here. You’re trying to help them understand (even a little bit) one facet of who God is–his omniscience. This is a fundamental belief we have to build many other things upon.
*Show a map of the world and talk about some things that could be happening in places far away right now.
*Ask: we can guess what people in these places are doing, but do we really know? Do they know what we’re doing right now?
*Texts: Matthew 10:29-31, Psalm 147.4-5
Week 4 God is all powerful
*Ask: ‘what is God like?’ Answer: God is holy, forgiving, knows all things, and is all powerful
*Define: All powerful or omnipotence: God’s unlimited authority to cause whatever he wants.
*Text: Genesis 1-2 God created something from nothing.
Week 5 God is just and merciful
*Ask: What is God like? Answers: holy, forgiving, knows everything, all powerful, and t he’s just and merciful.
*Ask for guesses on what just or justice is and what mercy or merciful means.
*Text: Jonah (shows God’s justice and mercy)
Key verses:
Jonah 1.1: God’s justice means he sees and must punish sin, but His mercy means he makes a way for us to return to Him (by sending Jonah to warn Ninevah about God’s anger)
Jonah 1.17: Even though Jonah did the exact opposite of what God told him to do and deserved to be swallowed up by the ocean, God sent a big fish to save him.
Jonah 3.5, 8: Ninevah was historically an evil people who had done TERRIBLE things to Jonah’s family and friends. They were so evil and they deserved God’s justice. God showed them mercy by sending Jonah to tell them of his anger and when they heard God’s words, they repented. They understood God’s mercy and were sorry for their evil.
*It’s important to point out that there are things that God can be that are different from us. We cannot be just and merciful at the same time in the way that God can. We’ve been talking for weeks about how God is like us in a few ways, but he’s MUCH different than us in many other and bigger ways. His being just and merciful both at once is another way this is true.
Week 6 God is eternal
*Ask: what is God like? Answers: holy, forgiving, knows everything, all powerful, just and merciful
*Ask for guesses on what ‘eternal’ means
*Define ‘eternal’ for our purposes: God is outside of time; time is something he CREATED
This means that God has always existed and does not change. Spend time here as the timing aspect is so complex. Belabor that God does not change. He doesn’t have bad moods or get sick or decide someone isn’t his friend anymore, etc.
*Text: Isaiah 40.28, Revelation 1.8
Week 7 God is loving
*Ask: what is God like? Answers: holy, forgiving, knows everything, all powerful, just and merciful, eternal
*Ask: what do you think ‘love’ means?
*Illustration: when I say the word ‘long’ we all have an idea of what the word ‘long’ means. The opposite is ‘short.’ It has to do with length and space maybe. But when I say ‘China is a long way from here’ and ‘that Sonic hotdog was a foot long,’ I’m using the same word but it has a little meaning.
It’s a similar situation when I say “God is loving.” A lot of times the love we think of is like the love we feel for ice cream or Christmas or our pet or maybe even our mom and dad. And as much as we love our mom and dad and as much as they love us, even that kind of love isn’t even the same as the love of God. The love of God is more and deeper and bigger than any kind of love we know about or can understand.
*Text: Luke 15.11-32 (They don’t understand God’s love at all. God’s love doesn’t have anything to do with how good we are it ONLY has to do with how good GOD IS).
Week 8 God is Good
*Ask: what is God like? Answers: holy, forgiving, knows everything, all powerful, just and merciful, eternal, and loving.
*Text: Story of Joseph (Genesis 37-50; key verse – Genesis 50:20)
*Promote discussion about the hard things that happened to Joseph, but how God was able to turn those things into good.