Jesus meets the children

Hi everyone and welcome back to Christchurch Kids. We hope you've had a great week in school. Have you been playing in the sunshine? It's been lovely to be outside. 

This week, Jo from The Little Worship Company has another story from the Bible for us to listen to. I wonder what she has in her story bag this week?

Talk Time

The stories in the Bible point us towards God. They tell us so many things. Now you have heard the story about Jesus meeting the children, have a chat to your family and see what you all think about it.

Here are some questions you can talk about...

How did Ben and Abi's family feel when they heard Jesus was coming to their town?

How did Ben feel when Peter and Andrew told him to stay away?

What did Peter and Andrew think about what Jesus said about children?

What did Jesus tell Ben?

Have you had a day when you felt how much God loves you?

This story tells us that we are never too small to be known and loved by God. In the Psalms, it tells us that God knew us even before we were born. Even the tiniest baby is already known and loved by God. 

I praise you because you made me in an amazing and wonderful way.
    What you have done is wonderful.
    I know this very well.
 You saw my bones being formed
    as I took shape in my mother’s body.
When I was put together there,

    you saw my body as it was formed.
All the days planned for me
    were written in your book
    before I was one day old.

Psalm 139 : 14-16

Prayer

Today we've been thinking about those children who were so excited to see Jesus that they pushed their way through the crowds. What do you think they wanted to tell Jesus when they saw him? Imagine you were there in the crowd. What do you want to tell Jesus? We can talk to him anytime. 

Take a moment to be still and quiet.

You can talk to Jesus in your head or out loud.

You can talk to him about what you thought about the story. 

Thank you Jesus that you love us all, no matter how big or small we are.

Amen

 

We have a great song today all about our story and what is what like waiting to see Jesus. We hope you enjoy joining in.

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We hope you have enjoyed listening to the story today and talking about it with your family. 

Next week, It's time for F@CT. We will be bringing you F@CT Online right here and we are also able to meet in church and have fun and learn about God together. If you would like to come to F@CT in church next week, 

click here to book your place.

 

Jesus catches fish

 Hi everyone and welcome back to Christchurch Kids. We hope you've had a lovely Easter holidays and have been able to get outside in the sunshine.

 Did you spend anytime at the beach this week? Our Bible story today takes place just by the water's edge. Jo from the Little Worship Company is going to tell us the story. I wonder what she has in her story bag today?

Talk Time

The stories in the Bible point us towards God. They tell us so many things. Now you have heard the story about Jesus catching fish, have a chat to your family and see what you all think about it.

Here are some questions you can talk about...

How do you think Peter felt when he hadn't caught any fish all night?

Why did Jesus hop into Simon's boat?

What would it have been like when the nets were so full of fish and the boats were filling up?

What do you think Jesus was showing everyone when the fish filled the nets?

Jo asked a great question at the end of the video...

Can you imagine Jesus popping into your school, or home, (or boat) saying "I'm here for you!" Would you be excited to follow him?

You may not recognise the name Simon as Jesus changed Simon's name to Peter. The name Peter means "The rock". Jesus changed Simon's name as he knew that Peter would be one of the rocks on which the church was built after Jesus had gone back to heaven. Jesus knew that God had amazing plans for Peter.

God has good plans for us too.

 I say this because I know what I have planned for you,” says the Lord. “I have good plans for you. I don’t plan to hurt you. I plan to give you hope and a good future.

Jeremiah 29 : 11

Prayer

Today in our prayers we can thank God for how amazing He is. He can even control the fish in the seas. Take it in turns with your family saying "Thank you God for...". Keep going and thinking of more things we say thank you for as you each take your turn.

Our song today is about following Jesus and there are some great actions to help us join in and praise Him.

We hope you all have a great time back at school this week. We'll be back here next week.

Sunday December 13th

 Hello and welcome to Christchurch Kids. We are looking forward to Christmas now. Have you got decorations up yet? 

The Three Kings Advent-ure

We've been following the three kings all week and today they have made it to the sea. It looks very blue today. I wonder if the kings will stop for a quick swim?

Where does the Christmas Story start? There are four books of the Bible that tell us about Jesus' life. They are Matthew, Mark, Luke and John and they are called the Gospels. Then word 'Gospel' means 'good news'. 

Matthew starts the story of Jesus with his family tree which goes all the way back to Abraham.

John starts the story at the very beginning of creation.

Mark starts the story when Jesus had already grown up and it starts with Jesus' cousin, John the Baptist and Jesus' baptism.

The Christmas story that we are most familiar with comes from Luke and he starts the story with a visit from an angel. It isn't the angel who came to see Mary, but the angel who came to visit Zechariah to say that his wife Elizabeth would have a baby.

Elizabeth was Mary's cousin and her baby grew up to be John the Baptist.

This is a really great retelling of the story of Zechariah and Elizabeth, complete with an unusual looking angel and a tiny bike!

Game

Our story above actually misses a little bit from the end of the story.

When John was born everyone thought that he should be called Zechariah after his father, as that was the custom. Zechariah wrote down that the baby's name would be John, just as the angel had told him. When he had done this he was suddenly able to talk again. 

Our game today is ... who can be the quietest the longest?

This is also a good game to play in the car.

Another variation of this game is deciding a word that no-one is allowed to say and the last person to say it wins. Sometimes this game can last for hours in our house as everyone tries to avoid saying "banana"!

Prayer

This week is the third week of Advent and in church we will be lighting the third candle in the Advent wreath. This candle is the Joy candle.

Let's take a moment to be quiet and talk to God. 

We can thank him for the joy that comes with Jesus' birth at Christmas, the joy that God loved us so much that he sent his Son.

We can ask God to help us remember that joy at times when we are finding things difficult or sad. 

We've got a joyful song today with some fun actions to get us celebrating together for Christmas. We hope you enjoy getting moving to this one.

Keep checking back here this week as we carry on with our online advent calendar. Where will the kings go on their journey around the town?

We are going to be having our Christmas Eve Christingle service online and we have a pack to make your own Christingle for every family who books one. We hope you can join us for songs, puppets, magic and lots of fun as we celebrate Christmas together.

Click here to book your Christingle pack.

The Story Keepers - Episode 5

Hello everyone and welcome to another action packed adventure with The Story Keepers. We have lots of unexpected twists and turns in today's episode. We hope you enjoy watching it.

(Some of you may notice that this episode is labelled Episode 8, but it matches with the week 5 worksheets in our activity book)

It's great that we can be Story Keepers too. By watching the video and learning the stories from the Bible we can share them with others and pass them on. Today, maybe it's enough to watch this video. If you would like to find out a bit more, keep reading...

There is a page for you to have a look at all about Episode 5 in the back of your Story Keepers Activity booklets. 

Our  BIG question today is... 

What is God's unexpected Good News for us?

In today's episode so many unexpected things happened. 

• Justin didn't think very highly of Cyrus' circus skills but they helped save the children from the Roman soldiers. 
• Cyrus thought he was going to treated badly by Flavius but he was treated like a prince... to start with. 
• It was very unexpected that Cyrus chose to stay with Flavius when Ben and the family come to rescue him. 

Did you think it was unexpected when the Story Keepers forgave Cyrus and Justin gave him his cloak?

Today we heard the parable of the Prodigal Son. A parable was a story Jesus told that tells us more about God. What does this parable tell us about God?

In this parable, God is the father and we are like the Prodigal Son. Every day we get things wrong, choosing to go our own way instead of relying on God. When we say sorry and turn back to God, He is always there waiting for us, running towards us for a big hug.

This is the unexpected good news. 

We will all get things wrong, because everyone does, but God will always forgive us. He doesn't just "forgive and forget" - it's even bigger than that. God came up with a rescue plan and that plan was Jesus. When Jesus died, he took the punishment for all the things we had done wrong. God loves us so much that his Son died for us - and then came back to life three days later!

This is sometimes called the gospel, which means GOOD NEWS.

This video explains that Good News really well...

Prayer

This month we are looking at Thankfulness in our prayers. We can say a huge THANK YOU to God for sending Jesus to be our rescuer.

If you want, you can say a special prayer that invites Jesus to be your friend forever. This is what we mean when someone says that they are a Christian. It means that they have prayed that special prayer.

There aren't any special words to become a Christian and you can talk to God about it using your own words. These words are an example of the prayer that you could pray.

Jesus – I know that you made me and want me to obey you with all my heart. 

I know I have disobeyed and wanted to go my own way. I have thought and done things against your directions. I am sorry. 

I know that you gave up your life to save me from these sins and make me your child again. 

I accept your promises and ask you to please save me now and forever. 

Amen.

God's Good News is so amazing it makes us want to jump up and down and spin right around! 

We can do that right now this song!

We hope you all have a fantastic week and we'll be back next Sunday with more adventures with the The Story Keepers.