Sept. 23, 2012 "The Bible is God's Message for Me"- Session 2 (continued)

This week we continued the presentation of the Fall session of extra Bible Curriculum materials for 5th graders, Session 2.   The Lesson is "The Bible is God's Message for Me" (‘BGMM’) covering the major topic of Salvation and JESUS our Savior.  The Fall session also has introduced the first topic of the “On the Right Path” (‘OTRP’)  which is the concept that there is a Right Path, following Jesus, and they have a choice to make.  They have to choose to either serve Jesus, or to follow “The Way of the World”.  

We teach them about serving Jesus, but we don’t make their choice for them; they have to make the choice themselves.   The first OTRP topic also includes teaching about the identity of the believer, as a child of God, and their God-given destiny, for this life.  God promises He will give them “a future and a hope” (Jeremiah 29:11).

The lesson presentation began, using the handout 5th Grade - Sunday School  Class NOTES Date: September 16 - 23, 2012.    You can view the Class Notes handout by clicking HERE .     Using page one of the handout, we taught about Jesus, as our Savior.  This began with the Scriptural truth without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins, and then a brief review of our teaching about God as being a Trinity (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit).    Then the presentation was made about Jesus, the Son of God, who became a man.   We discussed the miraculous birth of Jesus, and that His name is descriptive of His mission -- Yeshua means “God is my salvation”.    We again used our John 3:16 poster and also John 3:17 to emphasize that Jesus is our Savior.      Page two  of the Class Notes will be covered next week.

One student had a comment and question about the celebration of the miraculous birth of Jesus on Christmas Day, and about how Santa Claus came into the picture.    The answer given mentioned the actual person who lived about 1700 years ago, Saint Nicholas.  He was a devout Christian man known for giving, to help children, the poor, and the sick.    He also was known as a person gifted and able to perform miraculous signs, wonders, and healing; his reputation for secret giving (usually of coins) to children, and to other adults too, during the night, is probably part of the basis for the legends that have arose regarding Santa Claus.   The legends of Santa Claus have become a commercial enterprise; there is selling all kinds of merchandise for  gifts at Christmas time, and the birth of Jesus has been mostly pushed to the side.

The Emphasis Memory Verse will continue as a verse for reciting next week -- 1 Corinthians 16:13-14 (HCSB),    The HCSB text is shown below:

13 Be alert, stand firm in the faith, act like a man, be strong. 14 Your every action must be done with love.  

The other verse presented in class, Romans 5:8  is assigned as Memory Verse for 9/30/12.