"But the fruit of the Spirit is, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control." Galatians 5:22-23a
Our children's Church has been doing a unit on the fruit of the Spirit. Each week we learn one of the components on that list. This lesson is about gentleness.
Here is the story I adapted focusing on Jesus' gentleness. As with all scripture there are many facets to each episode. There are tons we can learn from them but when you teach children, consider the age and the maturity level of your kids. We are teaching 4-7 year olds and some of our 4 year olds are very "young". So this story has been adapted, not changing scripture but just being wise about what information a young child needs to know.
In this passage we see Jesus being gentle with a sinful woman. There are several scriptures portraying Jesus as gentle. You could choose any of them. For this unit the curriculum outline we follow uses this passage, so I adapted it for our age group.
Jesus & Woman in Sin, From John 8:2-11
[We won't reference adultery, we will just say that she sinned or did something wrong]
Items needed:
cotton balls -one per child
small piece of sand paper - one per child
Give each child a cotton ball and tell them it represents "gentleness". Have them gently stroke their arm and feel the gentle softness of the cotton ball.
Now give them a piece of sandpaper. Rub your finger over the sandpaper. Is it gentle or rough? Rough. This represents anger or harsh words.
As we read the story use the cotton ball when you hear someone being gentle and use the sandpaper when you hear harsh words.
Open your Bible to John 8
Say:
Early in the morning Jesus came to the Temple. A crowd gathered around him and he began to teach them about God. (gentle)
As he was teaching, some Pharisees dragged a woman in and shoved her in front of the crowd. (harsh)
If you'd like to see the rest of the lesson you can download it here for free.
Comments
Post a Comment