top of page
Why We Learn About Jesus

Unit 13 / Lesson 3

Why We Learn About Jesus

Slides for the Lesson

Click for slides
(they may take a moment to load)

Teacher's Prep

  • Games

    • Memory: Team Edition

    • Scoop the Snowballs

      • Watch this video to see what it is like

      • Materials (per group of four):

        • 1 bowl

        • 1 scoop

        • 1 table

        • About 50 cotton balls

        • A blindfold (disposable COVID masks work well)

        • Note: have some tongs available in case some have trouble with the scoop. Younger children can use the tongs or their hands.

    • Suck It Up

  • Main Activity (Service Coupons):

    • See this website for instructions:

    • Materials:

      • Print a template from the website above for each child -- one page of six coupons per child.

      • Materials for crafting and decorating

      • Scissors

      • Glue

      • Colorful Construction paper

      • Colored pencils, crayons, markers

      • Envelopes (or bag to hold completed service coupons)

      • A table

      • A bowl

      • A scoop

      • About 50 cotton balls

      • A blindfold


    Intro

  • SLIDE 1

  • Gathering

    • How was your week?

  • SLIDE 2

  • Intro Game: Memory: Team Edition

    • Instructions

      • We'll start this lesson with a game called Memory.

      • Teacher: play this short instructional video if you think any of the children are unfamiliar with Memory (the card matching game).

      • To play, we need to set up a table for every 4 to 6 people.

      • On each table, we need to have a lot of cards upside down and spread out neatly. Let's take a moment to set up the tables and the cards

      • Teacher: set up tables and cards with the children. Cards should end up in a grid formation.

      • Everyone, find a partner. When you've found your partner, go to a table.

      • Every table should have 4 to 6 people. You and your partner should stand on opposite sides of the table. You will be on opposite teams!

      • We will each take a turn flipping over two cards, seeing if they match. If they do, you get to keep the cards for your team. Work together with the people on your team and try to get as many matches as you can. If you run out of cards to match, you can start the game again.

      • Teacher: run the game for about 10 minutes.

    SLIDE 3

    • Debrief

      • We played this game because it's about learning things and remembering things.

      • There are probably too many cards for you to remember all of them, and you probably guessed wrong a bunch of times. But, that's okay! As long as you do your best and learn what you can, you'll have the best chance to win.

  • Relevance

    • It’s like that too for people who want to follow Jesus. There is lots to learn about Jesus, and sometimes we get things wrong. It really helps to know why we're trying so hard to learn about Him.

    SLIDE 4

  • Big Question

    • Our big question today is: Why should we try so hard to learn about Jesus?

  • Big Idea

    • Our big idea is: 

      • We should learn about Jesus so we can trust Him more than ourselves, because:

        • 1. We all have our favorite ideas, but

        • 2. Jesus is always right

  • Bible Reference

    • That's what we see in our Bible story today. Let's watch our story first, and then we'll read it afterwards.

    SLIDE 5

    SLIDE 6

    • Mark 9:2-10 (Contemporary English Version)

      • 2  Six days later Jesus took Peter, James, and John with him. They went up on a high mountain, where they could be alone. There in front of the disciples, Jesus was completely changed. 3 And his clothes became much whiter than any bleach on earth could make them. 4 Then Elijah and Moses appeared and were talking with Jesus.

    SLIDE 7

    • 5 Peter said to Jesus, “Teacher, it is good for us to be here! Let us make three shelters, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” 6 But Peter and the others were terribly frightened, and he did not know what he was talking about.

    SLIDE 8

    • 7  The shadow of a cloud passed over and covered them. From the cloud a voice said, “This is my Son, and I love him. Listen to what he says!” 8 At once the disciples looked around, but they saw only Jesus.

    SLIDE 9

    • 9 As Jesus and his disciples were coming down the mountain, he told them not to say a word about what they had seen, until the Son of Man had been raised from death. 10 So they kept it to themselves. But they wondered what he meant by the words “raised from death.”


    Point 1

  • Our first point is, we all have our favorite ideas.

    SLIDE 10

  • Game: Scoop the Snowballs

    • Instructions

      • Setup

        • For every group of four, set up

        • A table

        • A bowl

        • A scoop

        • About 50 cotton balls

        • A blindfold

      • We’ll start this point with a game! It's the Scoop the Snowballs challenge!

      • Let's watch a video to see what it is like:

      • Teacher: play this video: 

      • Here's how it works. You will be in teams of 4. In each of your teams, you will gather around a table and take turns being blindfolded and scooping the snowballs into a bowl.

      • Each of you will have two minutes to scoop as many snowballs as you can. Help each other out! If you're really struggling with the scoop, switch to tongs. (Or, if you’re really young, you can switch to using hands. But try using the scoop first.)

      • Teacher: run four rounds of the game so that each one can have a turn. Each child will have two minutes to get as many snowballs as they can into their bowl.

    • Debrief

      • In the game we just played, we didn’t know exactly where all the snowballs were. It’s like that in real life too.

    SLIDE 11

    • There are lots of things we don’t know, so we just do our best. But, we should expect to make a lot of mistakes when we don't know a lot of things.

    • That's what we see in our Bible story. Let's read the beginning of our story again.

  • Bible Reference

    SLIDE 12

    • Mark 9:2-6 (Contemporary English Version)

      • 2  Six days later Jesus took Peter, James, and John with him. They went up on a high mountain, where they could be alone. There in front of the disciples, Jesus was completely changed. 3 And his clothes became much whiter than any bleach on earth could make them. 4 Then Elijah and Moses appeared and were talking with Jesus.

    SLIDE 13

    • 5 Peter said to Jesus, “Teacher, it is good for us to be here! Let us make three shelters, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” 6 But Peter and the others were terribly frightened, and he did not know what he was talking about.

  • Explanation

    SLIDE 14

    • Our story starts with the words, "Six days later." This means a bunch of things happened before this story. In the chapter before, Jesus was teaching His disciples all kinds of things, but the disciples had a hard time learning because they thought they had better ideas than Jesus did.

    SLIDE 15

    • So, when Jesus wanted to feed a crowd of four thousand people, the disciples thought it couldn't be done because they didn't have any bread. And when Jesus told them He was going to die and come back to life, one of the disciples thought it was better to just not die in the first place.

    • Their ideas made a lot of sense. They thought that they were right and Jesus was wrong. 

    • They thought Jesus was wrong because they didn't understand who Jesus really was. In our Bible story, Jesus showed them who He really was.

    SLIDE 16

    • Jesus brought a few of His disciples up a mountain. His clothes started to shine and He started to look like someone from heaven.

    • Then, two of the great Bible heroes from long ago showed up and they started talking with Jesus.

    SLIDE 17

    • The disciples didn't know what was going on, so one of the disciples had an idea--they should all just stay on top of the mountain and hang out! That was Peter's best idea, but it was the wrong idea.

  • Application

    SLIDE 18

    • The lesson for us is that sometimes our best idea is wrong. It's good to try our best and to use our brains to think of new ideas, but we should remember that we're wrong sometimes. So, let's always be ready to learn the right way, and let's thank people when they teach us and correct us.

  • Discussion Question

    SLIDE 19

    • Let's pause for some discussion questions.

      • Who tells you that you are wrong sometimes? 

      • What is the best thing to do when someone corrects you when you are wrong?


    Point 2

  • Our first point is, Jesus is always right.

    SLIDE 20

  • Game: Suck it Up

    • Instructions

      • We'll start this point with a game! It's called Suck it Up.

      • Teacher: you may want to play this video which will show everyone how the game works:

      • We will have two teams. Each team will have two bowls, and your goal is to transfer all the Smarties from one bowl to the other bowl, and the only thing you can use is a straw. Someone from your team will put a straw in their mouth, and they’ll suck up the Smarties and move them to the other bowl one by one.

      • Once they’ve finished moving all the Smarties to the other bowl, the next person on your team will take a turn, and they’ll move all the Smarties back. Everyone on your team will have a turn moving the Smarties. When you all finish, you win!

    • Debrief

      • We played this game because there's basically only one way to play it.

      • If you have only one straw and a bunch of Smarties, the only way to pick them up is to use suction. It's a good thing that someone told us how to use the straw, and we didn't have to figure it out by ourselves.

    SLIDE 21

    • That's what it's like to follow Jesus sometimes. Sometimes He just tells us what to do, and there's no other way.

  • Bible Reference

    • Let's read from the Bible story again. Remember, Jesus and His disciples had gone up the mountain, and Jesus started to look like someone from heaven.

    SLIDE 22

    • Mark 9:5-8 (Contemporary English Version)

      • 5 Peter said to Jesus, “Teacher, it is good for us to be here! Let us make three shelters, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” 6 But Peter and the others were terribly frightened, and he did not know what he was talking about.

    SLIDE 23

    • 7  The shadow of a cloud passed over and covered them. From the cloud a voice said, “This is my Son, and I love him. Listen to what he says!” 8 At once the disciples looked around, but they saw only Jesus.

  • Explanation

    • Sometimes in the Bible, God shows up in a cloud, so when the voice came from the cloud, the disciples knew it was God’s voice saying words they would never forget.

    SLIDE 24

    • God said, “This is my Son, and I love Him. Listen to what He says! Human beings make mistakes, but Jesus never does.”

  • Application

    • That's how it works for us, too. We need to remember that human beings make mistakes, but Jesus never does.

    SLIDE 25

    • The better we know Jesus, the more we will listen to Him, learn from Him, and remember what He says, because His words are so special. Most of all, we will do what he says.

    • We know we are on the right track if we keep getting better at doing what He says.

    SLIDE 26

  • Discussion Question

    • Let's pause for a discussion question.

      • Why should we do what Jesus says?


    SLIDE 27

    Conclusion

  • Let’s wrap up our lesson by going over the big ideas again.

  • Our big question today is: Why do we try so hard to learn about Jesus?

  • Our big idea was:

  • We should learn about Jesus so we can trust Him more than ourselves, because:

    • 1. We all have our favorite ideas, but

    • 2. Jesus is always right


    SLIDE 28

    Main Activity: Service Coupons

  • That brings us to our main activity today! We will be making service coupons! These are little tickets that we can give to our parents and are a way to promise that we will do something for them.

  • For example, we can make a ticket that says we will clean our room, or clean the floor, or that we will do homework or reading for one hour.

  • We can explain to them that we’ll do whatever is on the ticket the best we can and without complaining.

  • We serve our parents like this because Jesus wants us to. It might not feel very good, and we might have other ideas that we think are more fun, but we need to trust that Jesus knows what He's doing when He tells us to listen to our parents.

  • For our activity, we're going to write down things that our parents can tell us to do, and we will decorate our tickets to make them look extra fancy.

  • Teacher: provide each child with a template, plus crafting and decorating materials to make the service coupons fancy. Write suggested chores on a board, which children can write on their service coupons.


We'd love to hear from you!

What can we do better? And what did you enjoy? Your insights will help us to serve churches better!

bottom of page