Parables

 

Week 1: Lost sheep, lost coin – Luke 15:3-10.

Burden for everyone: The creator of the universe values you. Respond to him!

 

Points:

·         God values us and wants to have a relationship with us. He goes to extremes to make this possible.

·         What parables are and why Jesus taught using them (to illustrate spiritual truth that would be hard to explain otherwise and to keep certain secrets about his mission hidden until the right time). Can get into this in the sower teaching too.

·         God proves he cares for us through the whole Bible and through his actions – especially his sacrifice for us. 

·         Not because we are such wonderful, perfect, lovable sorts of people. God loves us despite our faults (Romans 5:8).

·         We should respond to God based on our appreciation for what he has done for us

·         Paul spends half of Ephesians (and almost all of his other books) talking/praying about how much he wants them to understand God's love for them before getting into anything about how they should respond

 

Multimedia:

·         Some sort of finding something lost game. Maybe the one where the shoes get piled up and you have to find your shoes and put them on.

 

 

 

 

 

Week 2: Finders keepers – Matthew 13:44-52

Burden:

·         Non-Xians: Listen and respond to the. There are some serious consequences if you don't (e.g. what the passage says about the fish and the fishnet)

·         Xians: Make God a priority in your life. Don't take Him for granted – get closer to him.

 

Some points:

·         What God offers us is very valuable, but people often either ignore it (because they don't see how much they need it) or they start to take it for granted.

·         Pursuing God is worth sacrifice in other areas. You could talk about things like Phi. 3:8 "I consider all things dung in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus..."

 

Multimedia:

·         Hide some $5 bills in various places around building and have them search for them. 

 

 

Week 3: The sinful woman – Luke 7:36-50.

Burden:

Non-Xians: God will forgive you no matter how much you've done. Forgiven once for all, etc.

Xians: Avoid self-righteousness by humbling yourselves and remembering God's forgiveness.

 

Points:

·         God doesn't look at us the way that we look at each other. When we understand how much we are forgiven, we appreciate God's love for us more and see other people from God's point of view better.

 

Multimedia:

·         Maybe one of those drama things where we pick unwitting actors and have them act out parable. Script would be loosely based on the passage. 

 

 

 

 

 

Week 4: The Forgiven Slave – Matthew 18:21-35.

Burden:

·         Non-Xians: Accept God's forgiveness for yourself.

·         Xians: Forgive others, since God has forgiven you.

 

Points:

·         This is a big issue for Jr. High

·         Forgiving others is rooted in God's forgiveness of us. We need to understand how we are forgiven by God (and how much he loves us, etc.) in order to truly forgive others (refer back to the parable of the lost coins, and to the parable of the two people who owed money).

·         This is related to what we talked about in the parable of the two people who owed money (i.e. debtors).  Focus more on humility in the face of how we've wronged God, and on how we respond when others have wronged us.

·         Contrast what forgiveness is and what it isn't. 

 

Multimedia:

Discussion questions about forgiveness

 

 

 

 

 

Week 5: Foundation – Luke 6:46-49

Burden:

Non-Xians: Life without God is shaky. God offers you stability and peace. Grab onto it.

Xians: Build on your solid foundation; it would be foolish not to.

 

Points:

·         Could get into 1 Cor 3:10ff maybe, though that's more on how we build than on what foundation we should build on.

·         Issue is basically wisdom: to hear God and act on it is wise; to hear God and ignore Him is foolish.

·         Maybe discuss some of the reasons that we go our own way instead of following God.

·         Definitely talk about consequences of not following God.

 

Multimedia:

·         Tower building contests – get the blocks from upstairs, divide them into two, have small teams compete against each other to use all their blocks to build the tallest tower first (when one group has used all their blocks, call time and whoever's is taller wins).

 

 

 

 

 

Week 6: The sower – Luke 8:4-15.

Burden:

·         Be good soil. Don't let other things crowd out God's word!

 

Multimedia:

·         Maybe some testimonies from some students showing how they fit into different "soil types" at different parts of their life and how/why they turned around?