God's Special Love For Us - Story of the Progile Son

Circle Time

            Opening prayer

            Hello song.

Introduction to Bible Lesson

Each one of us is very special to God. We heard all about this wonderful world God created for us – Earth. We also heard about God’s wonderful gift he gave us – Jesus. We are learned about God’s great love for the people that obey him and that he gives us special abilities to do what he asks. Last class we heard about how God loves us and gives us families to take care of us.

Today we are going to hear another story about how family. We are also going to learn about how God’s love for us is a father’s love. This is a story that Jesus told to people when he was teaching about God’s love. It is found in Luke 15:11-32.

Bible Lesson

There was a boy who did not want to stay at home. He wanted to travel and see the world. He wanted to be very rich and have lots of friends and buy anything he ever wanted. The problem was that he lived with his dad and his brother. Everything around him belonged to his dad.

One day the boy went up to his dad and told him, “Dad, I want to go live on my own, be rich and have lots of things and lots of friends. I don’t want to wait until you die. Can I have half of everything you have right now? ”

This made the dad very sad because the boy already had everything he could ever want right at home. But, because his dad loved him so much, he gave the boy half of everything he had. Half of the sheep, half of the money, half of the house, half of everything.

The boy took it all and travelled far, far away to a different country. There he spent all his money on people who pretended to be his friends. When he ran out of money he sold everything he had just to keep partying with the people he was with. Before he knew it, he didn’t have any money and nothing left to sell. He was so poor, that he couldn’t even buy food for himself.  He had no food and his friends had all left him because he had no money.

He did the only thing that he could think of and went knocking door to door to try to find work. He finally found a job where he could feed the pigs. In payment he would get a place to sleep, but no one gave him any food.

The boy thought back to what it was like at his dad’s house. He missed his dad and he knew his dad would never let anyone go hungry. So he decided to go back to see his dad.

The dad had been missing his son for a long time. Every day, all day he would sit in front of his house to see if his young son was coming. Every day the dad went to bed very sad that his son did not come home.

One morning the dad was sitting outside of his house, looking down the road. While the boy was still far away from the house, the dad saw him. The dad got excited and jumped up. He ran down the long road to meet his son and gave him a big, big hug and kiss. He had missed him so much and was so glad his son was back home.

The boy started to cry. He was sorry for what he did to his dad and how he wasted his dad’s money. He asked his dad if he could work for him and be a servant. But his dad said to his servants, “Bring my best clothes for him, put rings on his fingers and put shoes on his feet. Make lots of food. We are going to have a big, big party. My son is home!” The dad forgave his son of everything he had did wrong.

The older son came home to find that everyone was celebrating. He got upset and asked his dad why his dad did not ever give a party for him. The dad told the older son that everything he had was his, but they need to celebrate that his brother had come home. They need to forgive his brother for the wrong things he did because that is what family does. Family is supposed to love each other no matter what. The brother understood and joined in celebration too.

God gave us the gift of family to show his love for us. Just like the dad in this story, God loves us no matter what we do. He is very, very happy when we remember him and talk to him in prayer. God always forgives us, even when we do things that are not so good. God loves us and that is why we call him our heavenly dad. God not only made our family, God is part of our family.

Crafts

1.      Pig Pen Craft

Materials: craft sticks cut in half, cardstock cutout of a pig and corncob and man, unpopped popcorn, brown construction paper sheet, glue

Have children create the scene.

Snack Time

Circle Time

            Song 1 – Theme song “God Made Me Special”

            Song 2 – God made me

Talk about forgiveness.

Say “Look at all these pencils. They all have an eraser for when they make mistakes.” Compare the pencils to people. Tell children that people have an eraser too. God is our eraser. When we ask forgiveness, He takes away our sins, just like the eraser wipes away the pencils' mistakes.

God has also given us the ability to forgive others. If other people hurt us, we need to forgive them just like God forgives us. Forgiveness is a gift that we give people when they hurt our feelings.  We can show forgiveness by giving the person who hurt us a hug or a smile.

God Made Me Special Activities

1.      I Can Forgive Craft

Materials: Paper, crayons

Have the children draw a picture of something that they can do to show a family member or a friend that they forgive them. The picture can be of a hug, a smile, a handshake or anything they come up with.

Closing

                        Closing prayer

Virtue to work on: Forgiveness to others