Devotion Time - Day One

Day 1

The Rescuer will come: prophecies from Isaiah 

Beginning Activity/ Treasure Hunt:

There are a number of different ways you could begin today depending on the time and resources you have on hand! You could:

Have them help you make a cape for each child out of an old T-shirt (tutorial found here: http://www.thesoutherninstitute.com/2011/03/super-hero-cape-and-power-cuff-tutorial.html ) Wrap all the materials to use as a treasure hunt first though!
Pre – prepare or use existing capes you have and wrap them up and have a treasure hunt for them
Use the DVD with Colin Buchanan’s “Super Saviour” song on it as a treasure hunt
Save the capes for later and make a “Super Saviour” picture for your wall together! Like this....

Chat:

Allow the children to go and find their “treasures” and bring them back to show each other but don’t unwrap them yet! Have a look at them, feel them, discuss what could be inside and build up excitement for the surprise. Have a talk about a time when you have been really excited about something. How did you feel waiting for it to happen/come? Who told you it was going to be happening/coming? Was it hard to wait? Are you finding it hard not knowing what is in your “treasures”? We’re going to open them in a minute but first we’re going to read a story about a special man called Isaiah, who lived a long time before Jesus was born – 700 years in fact. God gave Isaiah a special job to do and it wasn’t an easy job at all. God would speak to Isaiah and give him messages to pass onto the people who lived around him at the time. Sometime these messages included important information about the rescuer who was going to come and be their Super Saviour. Let’s see what Isaiah’s message was in our true story from the bible!

Read together “Operation “no more tears”” from The Jesus Storybook Bible p.144 

This true story from the bible tells us that:

GOD HAD AN EXCITING RESCUE PLAN FOR HIS PEOPLE – WHICH INCLUDES US! HE WAS GOING TO SEND A RESCUER FOR US.

Questions:

1.        Who was the man God told his rescue plan to? (Isaiah)

2.        Did Isaiah have to keep the rescue plan a secret? (No. He had to tell all the people living around him, which wouldn’t have been an easy job.)

3.        Why did God need to send someone to rescue his people? (They had been wandering away from God and disobeying Him. We too are guilty of doing wrong  and sinful things and we also need the rescuer))

4.        Who do you think the secret rescuer might be? (Jesus!)

What an exciting message God gave Isaiah to share with the people! He was going to send a rescuer for us, a Super Saviour who would take away and forgive us for all the wrong things we keep doing and allow us to be friends with God again. That is very exciting! You have all been so patient waiting to see what is in our special “treasures”, let’s open them and have a look at what is inside!

What do you think these “treasures” might be for? Who is our Super Saviour? That’s right Jesus!! 

Explain that together we are going to learn to song Colin Buchanan’s “Super Saviour” song and that the capes are to make it even more fun to fly and zoom around with while we are singing!

If you haven’t yet made the capes, spend time doing so and then put them on and have fun singing and learning the song together!

Prayer:

Dear Lord God, Thank you for having a rescue plan for all your people. Thank you that even though we do the wrong things sometimes, if we say we’re sorry, you’ll forgive us and we can be friends with you again. Thank you for sending Jesus to rescue us. Amen

Extra Memory Verse Activity:

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son. That whoever believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.” John 3:16

For a game to help introduce it, tape individual words from the verse under the kid’s chairs before family devotion time.

Tell the children the special memory verse that we are going to be learning for the next few weeks. You could use a special puppet to do so, saved just for memory verse activities and games!

Ask them to check under their chairs and see if there is anything there. Pull off the words and put them on the table. As they cannot read yet, ask each child to help come and stick the verse back together as their words come up and leave as a display on the wall for the weeks to come!

You could start practicing singing and doing the actions as in this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6dH_RgfGXw&feature=related

The version of the song used is from Seeds of Family Worship’s “Faith” CD and is called “John 3:16. The CD can either be bought through their website (http://www.seedsfamilyworship.net/) or you can download their songs & albums through iTunes.