Teaching Jeremiah 31

3-5s

Theme: God makes an amazing promise – that He will forgive sin and enable us to know Him

Aim: That they realise that this is a wonderful promise, that its fulfilled in Jesus, and that they trust this promise.

Big Idea – Look to Jesus (big glasses with Jesus written on)

Intro: Set a party scene with table cloth and streamers and banners. Get them to colour a party hat to begin with.

Story with pictures:

[Slide 1]The Lord says, “The time is coming when I will help the families of Israel and Judah and their children and animals to grow.

[Slide 2] In the past I watched over Israel and Judah, to pull them up and tear them down, to destroy them and bring them disaster. But now I will watch over them to build them up and make them strong,” says the Lord.

 [Slide 3] “Look, the time is coming,” says the Lord,
    “when I will make a new agreement
with the people of Israel
    and the people of Judah.
It will not be like the agreement
    I made with their ancestors
when I took them by the hand
    to bring them out of Egypt.
I was a husband to them,
    but they broke that agreement,” says the Lord.
“This is the agreement I will make
    with the people of Israel at that time,” says the Lord:
[Slide 4] “I will put my teachings in their minds
    and write them on their hearts.
I will be their God,
    and they will be my people.
[Slide 5] People will no longer have to teach their neighbors and relatives
    to know the Lord,
because all people will know me,
    from the least to the most important,” says the Lord.
[Slide 6] “I will forgive them for the wicked things they did,
    and I will not remember their sins anymore.”

The Lord makes the sun shine in the day
    and the moon and stars to shine at night.
He stirs up the sea so that its waves crash on the shore.
    The Lord All-Powerful is his name.

Recap:

Do you remember how Jeremiah had a really sad message for God’s people? They were going to be taken away from their home and have to live in a far away land for 70 years because God was angry with them.

Bible teaching:

Well…what’s this? [another leader hands an envelope] It’s an invitation! To a party! I love parties. This is an invitation to the best party ever! After all the horrible things that had been happening to God’s people, this is brilliant! Even though God’s people had messed up really badly and disobeyed God, He still longs for them to be living under His wonderful rule forever.

Let’s listen to Jeremiah’s wonderful message:

“The time is coming when I will help the families of Israel and Judah and their children and animals to grow. In the past I watched over Israel and Judah, to pull them up and tear them down, to destroy them and bring them disaster. But now I will watch over them to build them up and make them strong,” says the Lord.

That sounds great. God is going to rebuild their homes that had been destroyed. But that’s only a bit of what God tells them to look forward to. It gets better. God makes a new agreement with the people, a better agreement, it’s called a covenant.

Jeremiah said: “This is the agreement I will make
    with the people of Israel at that time,” says the Lord:
 “I will put my teachings in their minds
    and write them on their hearts.
I will be their God,
    and they will be my people.
 People will no longer have to teach their neighbors and relatives
    to know the Lord,
because all people will know me,
    from the least to the most important,”

God says that anyone can know Him totally. He will help them to live His way. Those who love God will want to do things His way and will hate doing things wrong.

Not only that, God then said,

“I will forgive them for the wicked things they did, and I will not remember their sins anymore.”

How amazing, all those terrible things that the people had done could be forgiven.

This is all about Jesus. Jeremiah is promising a day when Jesus will come and die on the cross for us, so that we might be forgiven. When Jesus will send the Holy Spirit to help us to live for Him. And when one day we will go to the best party ever, in heaven with the Lord Jesus. Only Jesus has made that possible, by dying so that we can know God totally.

Craft:

• Make party invitations
• Make party hats

Songs:

• Heaven is a party (Johnny Burns from How Cool is that)
• He Died Upon the Cross (Colin Buchanan)
• Jesus Died for all the children
• No more tears (both from A Very, Very Big God)

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5-11s

Theme: God makes an amazing promise – that He will forgive sin and enable us to know Him

Aim: That they realise that this is a wonderful promise, that its fulfilled in Jesus, and that they trust this promise.

Big Idea – Look to Jesus (big glasses with Jesus written on)

Intro: Set a party scene with table cloth and streamers and banners. Get them to colour a party hat to begin with.

Or recap the previous weeks ideas: Look around, look back, look to the future, look up, don’t look. (could do as Captain’s Coming style game)

Story with pictures:

[Slide 1]The Lord says, “The time is coming when I will help the families of Israel and Judah and their children and animals to grow.

[Slide 2] In the past I watched over Israel and Judah, to pull them up and tear them down, to destroy them and bring them disaster. But now I will watch over them to build them up and make them strong,” says the Lord.

 [Slide 3] “Look, the time is coming,” says the Lord,
    “when I will make a new agreement
with the people of Israel
    and the people of Judah.
It will not be like the agreement
    I made with their ancestors
when I took them by the hand
    to bring them out of Egypt.
I was a husband to them,
    but they broke that agreement,” says the Lord.
“This is the agreement I will make
    with the people of Israel at that time,” says the Lord:
[Slide 4] “I will put my teachings in their minds
    and write them on their hearts.
I will be their God,
    and they will be my people.
[Slide 5] People will no longer have to teach their neighbors and relatives
    to know the Lord,
because all people will know me,
    from the least to the most important,” says the Lord.
[Slide 6] “I will forgive them for the wicked things they did,
    and I will not remember their sins anymore.”

The Lord makes the sun shine in the day
    and the moon and stars to shine at night.
He stirs up the sea so that its waves crash on the shore.
    The Lord All-Powerful is his name.

Talk

[Someone brings an invitation].  I wonder what this is? [Open it].  Wow, I’ve been invited to a party!  I love parties – I can’t wait.  Wow, I’m really looking forward to it already.  It’s from a really good friend of mine, but it doesn’t seem to say when it’s going to be, it’ll be great – I’m so excited, I wonder when it is?

Who can tell me what you like about a party?  Parties are great and something that we all look forward to.  Has anyone got a birthday coming up?  Do you remember when that is?  And are you looking forward to it?  Well I’m really looking forward to this party, it says there’s going to be cake and everything.

Do you know though, we have something even better to look forward to than even the bestest, biggest party ever. 

This week we’ve been hearing about what Jeremiah has been telling to the people of Israel.  Have they been having a party and having fun?  No, just the opposite.  We've heard about how they have disobeyed God and about how they are being punished for doing wrong things.  I’m sure all of us have been punished for doing wrong things and it’s not nice.  And it’s far worse when we do something wrong against God than against our parents or against our teachers at school. 

God is so much more important than our teachers, or our parents or whoever looks after us.  God made the whole world, everything in it.  He made us and the Israelites, he had given them everything they had.  And the Israelites had an agreement with God that they would love him and follow his rules.  But we’ve heard about how they broke that agreement.  That’s what they were being punished for.  And we’ve had lots of sadness all week as Jeremiah’s told us why things have been bad for the Israelites.

But in today’s true story from the bible God tells them that they have something amazing to look forward to – even better than a party.  The Israelites were suffering a horrible time, and here God is telling them that it’s going to get better.

In these verses Jeremiah gives them a really happy message from God.  Jeremiah tells us that they have a great day to look forward to.  On that day God's going to stop punishing them.  It will be the end of their homes being destroyed and, instead, God’s going to build their homes back up again. 

Our passage starts with: The Lord says, “The time is coming when I will help the families of Israel and Judah and their children and animals to grow. In the past I watched over Israel and Judah, to pull them up and tear them down, to destroy them and bring them disaster. But now I will watch over them to build them up and make them strong,” says the Lord.

That sounds great.  But that's only a bit of what God tells them they can look forward to.  It gets better.   God makes a new agreement with the people, a better agreement. 

Jeremiah said: “This is the agreement I will make with the people of Israel at that time,” says the Lord: “I will put my teachings in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.
People will no longer have to teach their neighbours and relatives to know the Lord, because all people will know me, from the least to the most important,” says the Lord.

The people weren’t following God’s teachings and that’s why they were being punished.  But God says he’s going to write his teachings, how they should live and who God is, on their hearts. 

That’s a funny thing to say.  Who knows where their heart is?  That’s right, here inside us.  Have you ever tried writing on it?  Don’t, you can’t and you might hurt yourself.  The problem for the people of Israel was that they broke the agreement with God, they didn’t do what he asked them to do.  The old agreement, it’s like they took God’s invitation and just left it, ignored it, ripped it up and were horrible to God. 

We can’t be friends with God who is perfect and pure and special if we don’t follow his ways and thank him for what he’s given us.  We can’t go to his party.

And that’s where the people were – being punished from God for doing wrong things, for ignoring the old agreement, the teachings.  But God says there’s a time to look forward to when he’s going to put his teachings in their heart so that they never forget him, never loose them.  They will be in a close relationship with him again, not like when sin gets in the way.  In fact, he will forgive us for our sin, for the wrong things we do and let us be friends with God again.  Because people would still do wrong things and turn away from God, but God says he’d forgive them and not punish them. 

God’s got a great party waiting for them.  But they all ignored God and so couldn’t go to his party.  But now, God says he will still be their friends and they can still come to his party and they won’t be punished for the wrong things they have done. 

Jeremiah then tells us that God said: “I will forgive them for the wicked things they did, and I will not remember their sins anymore.”

Well good things did happen – a bunch of years later the Israelites did come back to live in the special land.  But it wasn't quite right, they still did wrong things and God still punished them.  But they still had the party to look forward to.

And then Jesus came.  Jesus was special, Jesus was God’s son and he never did anything wrong.  Can you imagine that; someone who didn’t ever do anything wrong, who never said anything not nice to his friends, who always did what his parents asked.  So Jesus didn’t deserve the punishment that we all deserve.  But Jesus was punished, Jesus died to take away the punishment for our sins and make us friends with God again.  That’s really amazing.  We have done wrong things, but he was punished for them. 

Through Jesus God makes a new agreement with us.  He invites us to a party but we will never ignore the invitation, loose it or not get to go, because it’s right here in our hearts.  If we love Jesus we can go to the biggest, best party ever, in heaven with God. 

Loving Jesus and being a Christian means that he takes the punishment that we deserve and we are friends with God again.  We get an invitation to the final, biggest party.  Because one day the bible tells us Jesus is going to come back and everyone who loves Jesus has been forgiven for the wrong things they do and will go to live with God forever in heaven.  Those who don't will be punished.  On that day - that's going to be the best party ever, that's the thing to look forward to.

Table time:

Put pictures in order and answer these questions –

Knowledge

• What did God say He was going to do?

• Who will He do this for?

Understanding

• When did God do this?
• How did God do this?
• How do we know God is able to do this?

Application

• What’s the most amazing thing about what God has done?
Have you taken Jesus’ wonderful invitation of forgiveness and a changed heart?

Funsheets

Memory verse:

Jeremiah 31:34

all people will know me,
    from the least to the most important,” says the Lord.
“I will forgive them for the wicked things they did,
    and I will not remember their sins anymore.”

Teaching Jeremiah 26-29

5-11s

Theme: People will always reject God’s Word

Aim: That they trust God’s Word even when that’s not easy

Big Theme: Don’t Look (ie don’t look at what the false prophets are saying)

Intros:

• True / False – two children read out facts about the same things. Only one is telling the truth. They need to decide which.
• Thumb wars

Recap:

Jeremiah has been speaking to the people about how they will be taken away into Babylon (the smashed pot from last week). Do you think people liked that?

Bible Teaching:

Prophet smackdown – Have one child dressed as Jeremiah and one as a false prophet.

Jeremiah: Judah, you will have to wear a heavy harness, a yoke. Babylon will treat you like slaves. This will last for 70 years.

Children: Ooooh!

Hananiah: Within two years God will bring you back from Babylon.

Children: Phew!

[Leader: Both can’t be right! Who’s telling the truth?]

Jeremiah: I wish that were true, it would be much nicer. Whichever one happens, that’ll show the true prophet.

Children: Ooooh!

Hananiah: [breaks the yoke on Jeremiah] Thus says the Lord, I will break the yoke of Babylon in two years!

Children: Phew!

Jeremiah: Listen Hananiah, the Lord has not sent you, and you have made this people trust in a lie. Therefore, thus says the Lord: Behold I will remove you from the face of the earth. This year you shall die, because you have uttered rebellion against the Lord.

Hananiah: Urgh! [dies]

Children: Oooh!

Talk:

Some people will tell us things that claim to be from God, just as they did in Jeremiah’s day. But sometimes we’ll really want to believe them because what they’re saying is really nice.

Here are some of the things they might be saying:

            God isn’t angry with you because you’ve sinned!

            A God of love wouldn’t send anyone to hell!

            You’ll be alright!

            I know when Jesus is coming back!

You may hear some of those things and they sound really convincing. Remember what Jeremiah said, the test is whether what they say comes true. And we must test these things against what the Bible says.

So listen carefully when people (even us) claim to speak for Jesus, check it against the Bible.

Table time:

Questions:

Knowledge

What did Jeremiah say was going to happen?

What did Hananiah say was going to happen?

What actually happened?

Understanding

How do we know which one was the true prophet?

Who should they not have listened to?

Why did the people want to listen to Hananiah?

Application

How do we know when someone is telling us the truth about Jesus?

When are we going home to be with Jesus?

What should we do if people tell us that God won’t judge us?

Funsheet

Craft – prophet finger puppet wrestling

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3-5s

Theme: People will always reject God’s Word

Aim: That they trust God’s Word even when that’s not easy

Big Theme: Don’t Look (ie don’t look at what the false prophets are saying)

Intro:

Truth and Lie – have some true facts and some made up facts about the leaders. If they think something is true they stand up, if they think it’s a lie they sit down (make the lies ridiculous)

Bible teaching:

Recap – remember, a long time before Jesus came, Jeremiah was telling God’s people that they were going to have to go to a foreign land called Babylon. The people hated that and hated Jeremiah for saying it.

[have two puppets or two finger puppets – one Jeremiah and one Hananiah]

Shall we listen to what Jeremiah says? [whispers in ear]

What’s that? God’s people are going to have to live in this foreign land for 70 years! That’s a long time.

Do you think God’s people wanted to live in Babylon, away from their families for 70 years? No.

Hananiah wants to say something [whispers in ear]. Oh phew! Hananiah says they won’t. They’ll only be in Babylon for 2 years. Oh, that’s a relief. That’s much nicer to hear isn’t, boys and girls?

Oh, hang on. [Jeremiah whispers]. Jeremiah say, if only that were so. But sadly Hananiah has got it totally wrong! Jeremiah says he’s telling the truth and it will definitely be for 70 years.

Boys and girls, how do we know who’s telling the truth? I’d much rather believe Hananiah, wouldn’t you? But that doesn’t mean he’s right.

Sometimes it can be hard to know who’s telling the truth. Sometimes people will tell us lots of things about God, maybe at school or we’ll hear them on the street and we’re not sure what to believe.

If they’re telling the truth then what they say will come true. [Jeremiah whispers again]. What’s that, Hananiah is going to die because he’s told lies about God. Well that’s very serious! We’ll know if Jeremiah is telling the truth about God if that happens. Urgh. [knock off Hananiah puppet] Jeremiah was right. Hananiah has died. How sad and how serious. That must mean Jeremiah is telling the truth about everything.

We can totally trust the Bible and the Bible sometimes says really hard things like,

• God is angry when we sin [angry face]
• God won’t let people say ‘no’ to Him forever, there is a place called hell
• We don’t know when Jesus will come back to take us to be with Him
• There are things that we like doing but God wants us to stop

Let’s listen to God in the Bible, check what people are telling you about Jesus. Trust that God tells the truth even when that’s something that you don’t like.

Activities:

• Jeremiah and Hananiah finger puppets

Songs:

• God speaks (from Doctor Rocktrine)
• Two Little Eyes (from Very, very Big God)

• I am the Way the Truth and the Life

Teaching Jeremiah 18-19

3-5s

Theme: God is in charge and does what He sees as best

Aim: That they listen and turn to God with all their heart before it’s too late

The Big Idea is: LOOK UP! – look up and see who God is

Intro:

Give each child a bit of clay (or playdough). Get them to make something out of it, anything they like. Then they have to describe what it is they have made.

Bible bit:

Do you remember that Jeremiah was coming and warning the people that God was angry with their sin and that they would be thrown out of their homes if they didn’t turn to Him? Do you remember why? – worshipping silly statues. Do you remember that they thought they could take a piece of clay and shape it to be their God? Well they had got it completely the wrong way round!

Part of their problem was that they had forgotten how BIG! God was. They had forgotten that God was in charge of them, that He was their maker.

So God uses a picture to help them to understand. He tells Jeremiah to say to them that God is the potter and they are the clay. God can shape them anyway He wants. He knows what is best for them.

So God sends Jeremiah down to the potters house and Jeremiah sees the potter working at his wheel.

(Could show: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-wmbM6EpZU )

The potter makes a pot [take some clay and make a pot]. Oh, but it’s not quite right! He needs to shape it a bit more to make it right, change it a bit here, work on it a bit there. That’s what God is doing with His people, says Jeremiah. If they turn to Him then God will change them, help them to be more loving and kind.

We too must remember that God is BIG! He knows what is best for us and if we turn and worship Him He will begin to change us to make us more like Jesus. Just as you shaped your models so God shapes you, making you more loving and kind and patient and generous. So let Him shape you into who He wants you to be.

Sometimes we’ll wonder what God is doing, maybe because sad things happen or bad things happen. But never forget that God always knows best for us and He is always in charge.

Activities:

• Make a pot out of clay – attach Jer 18:6b
• Collage saying ‘God is Big!’

Spare games:

• God says (Simon says)

Songs:

• Jesus is the Mighty, mighty King
• Who’s the King of the Jungle
• My God is so Big

5-11s

Theme: God is in charge and does what He sees as best

Aim: That they listen and turn to God with all their heart before it’s too late

 The Big Idea is: LOOK UP! – look up and see who God is

Intro:

• Pictionary with playdough – the answers are all stuck around the room high up. They just need to ‘look up’!

Bible teaching:

Do you remember the problem that Jeremiah was pointing out to the people?

They were worshipping silly statues. They thought that they could take a piece of clay and shape it and, voila, there’s God!

Jeremiah has a really important message for them. They’ve got it totally the wrong way round: God isn’t the clay, they are!

Jeremiah reads 18:1-3.

(Could show: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-wmbM6EpZU )

If there’s a mistake in the pot, who corrects it?

Jeremiah reads 18:4-8.

God says that they are the pot and He is the potter. He’s so much bigger than they’d realised. He is ready to shape them into who He wants them to be. And its God’s choice whether He throws them away.

When you make a model at school or home, it’s your choice how you make it. And then once you’ve made it, it’s your choice whether you keep it and put it on your mantle piece or whether you throw it away. Well the same is true of God. He has made us and He is in charge of us.

So God says, if they repent and turn to Him they will be fine. If they listen and worship Him, He will rescue them. The same is true of us, if we listen to Him, He will change us. He will make us more like His Son Jesus, full of patience and kindness and grace and love, if we let Him.

But there will come a time when it is too late. Later Jeremiah says to them:

Jeremiah reads 19:1-2.

Jeremiah was to take a fired jar from the potter. [pick up a cheap vase]

Jeremiah reads 19:10-11. [smash the vase]

It was too late for God’s people by this stage in Jeremiah’s message. They had hardened their hearts to God, not listening, not turning back to Him. And it was too late. They were now like that pot, unable to change.

Well, the day will come when its too late for us to change. When Jesus returns either we will have listened and become more like Him, or we will have become hard and not changed by grace. And that would be very bad news!

When Jeremiah preached this, did they like it? No! They locked him up. When Jesus preached the same message years later, did they like it? No! They killed Him.

Table time:

Questions (have some clay – every time one gets a question right, they have 10 secs to make something out of clay)

Knowledge

• What does Jeremiah say God is like?
• What does Jeremiah say the people are like?
• What did Jeremiah do to the hardened pot?

Understanding

• How is God like a potter?
• How are we like the clay?
• How will Jesus’ return be like the smashed pot?

Application

• When do you not listen to God and put Him first?

• Where can you see that Jesus has been changing you recently?
• Are there things which you think you can get away with before God?

Activities:

Younger ones – make a pot with Jer 18:6b attached

Funsheet

Memory verse – Jeremiah 18:6b (in fortune cookies?)

Teaching Jeremiah 11 to 15

3-5s

Intro:

Clue – telescope: bring out a telescope and say it is a special telescope for looking into the future. Jeremiah is giving God’s people a glimpse into what will happen in the future.

Use ‘Old Booth’ to make old photos of the children

Read story with pictures:

[Slide 1]This is what the Lord said to me: “Go and buy a linen belt and  put it around your waist. Don’t let the belt get wet.”

[Slide 2] So I bought a linen belt, just as the Lord told me, and put it around my waist. Then the Lord spoke his word to me a second time: “Take the belt you bought and are wearing, and go to Perath. Hide the belt there in a crack in the rocks.” So I went to Perath and hid the belt there, just as the Lord told me.
[Slide 3] Many days later the Lord said to me, “Now go to Perath and get the belt I told you to hide there.” So I went to Perath and dug up the belt and took it from where I had hidden it. But now it was ruined; it was useless.
[Slide 4] Then the Lord said to me: “In the same way I will ruin the people of Judah and Jerusalem. These evil people refuse to listen to my warnings. They stubbornly do only what they want to do, and they follow other gods to serve and worship them. So they will become like this linen belt—useless. As a belt is wrapped tightly around a person’s waist, I wrapped the families of Israel and Judah around me,” says the Lord. “I did that so they would be my people and bring fame, praise, and honour to me. But my people would not listen.

[Slide 5] I will cry painfully,
    and my eyes will overflow with tears,
    because the Lord’s people will be captured.

All Judah will be taken as prisoners to a foreign land;
    they will be carried away completely.

[Slide 6] You might ask yourself,
    “Why has this happened to me?”
It happened because of your many sins.
Can anyone change the colour of his skin?
    Can a leopard change his spots?
In the same way, Jerusalem, you cannot change and do good,
    because you are always doing evil.

[Slide 7] “I will scatter you like rubbish that is blown away by the desert wind.
This is what will happen to you;
    this is your part in my plans,” says the Lord.
“Because you forgot me
    and trusted in false gods,
[Slide 8] I have seen the terrible things you have done:
your hateful acts
    on the hills and in the fields.
How terrible it will be for you, Jerusalem.
    How long will you continue being unclean?”

Teaching:

Talk:

Have you ever broken one of your favourite toys accidentally? How did it make you feel? Upset?

Have you ever broken a toy when you’re angry, maybe because you’ve thrown it, or dropped it off a sofa?

It can be sad when our favourites things break. Well in our story today we saw that something that God cared for was broken. It’s actually quite a sad story, and quite a hard one for us to listen to, so lets pray that God would help us to understand it.

It was a bit odd, Jeremiah was talking about a belt. It might have been a bit like this… It was a new belt, one that Jeremiah wore. Then God told him to go hide it. So Jeremiah did. Then a few days later God told Jeremiah to go and get it back. When Jeremiah found it, it was ruined. It was all dirty, it couldn’t be used as a belt anymore.

And God said. That is what is going to happen to my special people. They are going to be ruined, they are going to be broken and useless, like those toys we talked about earlier.

But what god says about his special people and how they get ruined is quite odd. He says it doesn’t happen accidentally, like our toys we may have broken. God’s people don’t get broken and God just says “Ooops” because God never says oops. He says that he is going to ruin his special people. God is going to be the one who breaks his most favourite thing. He is going to do it because his special people do not listen to him. They don’t worship him, but they worship silly statues. As we looked at last week, they turn their backs on God and think that other things are more important, or better than him.

And that makes God sad and angry, because they’re just silly statues, they can’t do anything to save them. They’re just made of wood or stone, they’re not real. God says, like the belt was around Jeremiah, well my special people were around me, they knew me, they knew all the fantastic things that I had done for them, but they didn’t listen to me, they ignored God.

So God’s special people would get invaded, they would get beaten by another country and carried away. Because sin makes God angry. And they hadn’t looked back, they hadn’t learnt from what Israel had done.

And our sin makes God angry too. Whenever we turn our back on God, whenever we tell him to Stuff off, and say that I’m in charge, and so No to Jesus, that makes God angry.

There isn’t really any good news in our Bible story today. It’s not good that our sin makes God angry, but it is true. God is (big word alert) holy. That means that he is super perfect and can’t have anything to do with sin.

But this story reminds me of another story in the Bible where we see God being angry about sin. You may have heard it before, but it happened quite a few years after Jeremiah. But instead of God being angry at lots of people, he was angry at one person.

Listen to this little bit from the book of Mark 15:33-37.

When Jesus died on the cross God was pouring out His anger on Him instead of us.

That is how we know that God will forgive us. Yesterday we saw that God invites us back – this is how he invites us back, with Jesus, because Jesus gets ruined instead of us.

So when we sin, when we turn our back on God and do what we want to do not what he wants us to do we still make God sad and angry, so we still need to say sorry. But we know that God will forgive us, because Jesus has died on the cross, and God was angry with all our sin on Jesus, so after we have said sorry, we also need to say thank you, because Jesus took our place.

Craft:

Make a telescope with the Bible verse on

Leopard mask and stick on spots

Make a linen belt

Songs:

God sits in the Highest Place (from Colin Buchanan’s God Rock)

10,9,8 God is great (from Colin Buchanan’s 10,9,8)

 
5-11s

Intro:

Clue – telescope: bring out a telescope and say it is a special telescope for looking into the future. Jeremiah is giving God’s people a glimpse into what will happen in the future.

Use ‘Old Booth’ to make old photos of the children

  
Use same story as above

Talk:

Have you ever broken one of your favourite toys accidentally? How did it make you feel? Upset?

Have you ever broken a toy when you’re angry, maybe because you’ve thrown it, or dropped it off a sofa?

It can be sad when our favourites things break. Well in our story today we saw that something that God cared for was broken. It’s actually quite a sad story, and quite a hard one for us to listen to, so lets pray that God would help us to understand it.

It was a bit odd, Jeremiah was talking about a belt. It might have been a bit like this… It was a new belt, one that Jeremiah wore. Then God told him to go hide it. So Jeremiah did. Then a few days later God told Jeremiah to go and get it back. When Jeremiah found it, it was ruined. It was all dirty, it couldn’t be used as a belt anymore.

And God said. That is what is going to happen to my special people. They are going to be ruined, they are going to be broken and useless, like those toys we talked about earlier.

But what god says about his special people and how they get ruined is quite odd. He says it doesn’t happen accidentally, like our toys we may have broken. God’s people don’t get broken and God just says “Ooops” because God never says oops. He says that he is going to ruin his special people. God is going to be the one who breaks his most favourite thing. He is going to do it because his special people do not listen to him. They don’t worship him, but they worship silly statues. As we looked at last week, they turn their backs on God and think that other things are more important, or better than him.

And that makes God sad and angry, because they’re just silly statues, they can’t do anything to save them. They’re just made of wood or stone, they’re not real. God says, like the belt was around Jeremiah, well my special people were around me, they knew me, they knew all the fantastic things that I had done for them, but they didn’t listen to me, they ignored God.

So God’s special people would get invaded, they would get beaten by another country and carried away. Because sin makes God angry. And they hadn’t looked back, they hadn’t learnt from what Israel had done.

And our sin makes God angry too. Whenever we turn our back on God, whenever we tell him to Stuff off, and say that I’m in charge, and so No to Jesus, that makes God angry.

There isn’t really any good news in our Bible story today. It’s not good that our sin makes God angry, but it is true. God is (big word alert) holy. That means that he is super perfect and can’t have anything to do with sin.

But this story reminds me of another story in the Bible where we see God being angry about sin. You may have heard it before, but it happened quite a few years after Jeremiah. But instead of God being angry at lots of people, he was angry at one person.

Listen to this little bit from the book of Mark 15:33-37.

Mark is talking about Jesus dying on the cross. There’s 2 things that helps me see that God was angry here. 1) it went dark for 3 hours and 2) Jesus says that God has left him alone. When Jesus dies on the cross, God was angry. But Jesus hadn’t done anything wrong, he was perfect, he had never sinned. But here we see that God is angry. Why is God angry? Well because on the cross, Jesus had all our sin on him. Everything that we do which makes God angry, is on Jesus. So God gets angry with our sin, but Jesus is the one who takes our place. Just like the belt that got ruined, Jesus gets ruined instead of us. That is how much God loves us. That is how special we are to him.

That is how we know that God will forgive us. Yesterday we saw that God invites us back – this is how he invites us back, with Jesus, because Jesus gets ruined instead of us.

So when we sin, when we turn our back on God and do what we want to do not what he wants us to do we still make God sad and angry, so we still need to say sorry. But we know that God will forgive us, because Jesus has died on the cross, and God was angry with all our sin on Jesus, so after we have said sorry, we also need to say thank you, because Jesus took our place.

Table time:

Funsheets

Leopard mask and stick on spots

Questions:

Put pictures of story in order in the group.

Knowledge

• God had ‘tied’ Himself to caring for His people, Judah, but what had they done? How did God show this?
• Can a leopard change its spots? Could Judah change and obey God?
• What’s going to happen to Judah? Will it be nice?

Understanding

• Why did God need to change their hearts?
• How did Jeremiah feel about what God was going to do to Judah?
• What is going to happen to people who say ‘no’ to God today?

Application

• Do you think it will be wonderful to be with Jesus forever?
• What are you looking forward to most about it?
• What should we do for our friends who say ‘no’ to God?

Teaching Jeremiah 3

3-5s

Theme: Learn from what God has done in the past and come to Him with all your heart

Aim: That they understand that God doesn’t change and will still deal with those who reject Him, but the children will hear God inviting them back to Him.

Intro:

During news one leader sits with their back to the class. Eventually they are sent out!

Story:

Read with powerpoint pictures:

When King Josiah was ruling Judah, the Lord said to me,[Slide 1] “Did you see what sneaky Israel did? [click] She wandered away with her idols on every hill and under every green tree. I said to myself, ‘Israel will come back to me after she does this evil,’ but she didn’t come back. [slide 2] And Israel’s wicked sister Judah saw what she did. Judah saw that I left sneaky Israel because of what she did, but that didn’t make Israel’s wicked sister Judah afraid. [click] She also went out and did the same! And she didn’t care that she was hurting me. So she made her country unclean because she worshiped idols made of stone and wood. [slide 3] Israel’s wicked sister didn’t even come back to me with her whole heart, but only pretended,” says the Lord.

The Lord said to me, “Unfaithful Israel had a better excuse than wicked Judah. [Slide 4] Go and speak this message toward the north:

‘Come back, unfaithful people of Israel,’ says the Lord.
[click]    ‘I will stop being angry at you,
because I am full of mercy,’ says the Lord.
    ‘I will not be angry with you forever.
All you have to do is admit your sin—
    that you turned against the Lord your God
and worshiped gods under every green tree
    and didn’t obey me,’” says the Lord.

[slide 5] “Come back to me, you unfaithful children,” says the Lord, “because I am your master. I will give you new rulers who will be true to me, who will lead you with knowledge and understanding. In those days they will not follow their hard, evil hearts anymore.

“I, the Lord, said,

[slide 6] ‘How happy I would be to treat you as my own children
    and give you a pleasant land,
    a land more beautiful than that of any other nation.’
I thought you would call me ‘My Father’
    and not turn away from me.
[slide 7] But family of Israel, you have left me,” says the Lord.

This is what the Lord says to the people of Judah and to Jerusalem:

Give yourselves to serving the Lord,
    and decide to obey him,
[slide 8] If you don’t, my anger will spread among you like a fire,
    and no one will be able to put it out,
    because of the evil you have done.

Talk:

Do you remember that God had split His country into 2 [bring out map]. Israel in the north and Judah in the south? Do you remember what had happened to Israel? They had been thrown out for praying to statues instead of to God.

Judah had seen that God hates it when we turn our back on Him and worship idols, silly statues. Judah had seen what God had done to Israel, but they didn’t learn! They carried on doing exactly the same when they should have known better.

So God calls them to turn back to Him, to love Him with all their hearts and throw away their silly statues which He hates so much! If they don’t, they’re in big trouble!

We don’t bow down to silly statues, but sometimes we make people and stuff more important than God. When we do that it’s like turning our backs on God.

Sometimes we think about other things more than God. We love watching TV. TV is a good thing. But if we think about that more than God, if we love watching that more than talking to God, then that’s like turning our back on God. Or maybe we love … more than God.

God is calling us to turn around. To love Him more than anything and to come back to Him with all our hearts. If we don’t He will still be angry with us and that’s horrible!

Activities:

Funsheet

Boomerang craft

Games:

What’s the time Mr Wolf

Songs:

God Speaks (from Dr Rocktrine)

God sits in the Highest Place

God never says Oops! (both from Colin Buchanan’s God Rock album)

5-11s

Theme: Learn from what God has done in the past and come to Him with all your heart

Aim: That they understand that God doesn’t change and will still deal with those who reject Him, but the children will hear God inviting them back to Him.

Intro – during news time have one leader sat with their back to the group. Keep warning that leader to turn around, then send them out!

Could play What’s the Time Mr Wolf

Or Turn Around Skittles (children are skittles – another child bowls the ‘eye’ ball. If it hits they have to turn around

Story:

When King Josiah was ruling Judah, the Lord said to me,[Slide 1] “Did you see what sneaky Israel did? [click] She wandered away with her idols on every hill and under every green tree. I said to myself, ‘Israel will come back to me after she does this evil,’ but she didn’t come back. [slide 2] And Israel’s wicked sister Judah saw what she did. Judah saw that I left sneaky Israel because of what she did, but that didn’t make Israel’s wicked sister Judah afraid. [click] She also went out and did the same! And she didn’t care that she was hurting me. So she made her country unclean because she worshiped idols made of stone and wood. [slide 3] Israel’s wicked sister didn’t even come back to me with her whole heart, but only pretended,” says the Lord.

The Lord said to me, “Unfaithful Israel had a better excuse than wicked Judah. [Slide 4] Go and speak this message toward the north:

‘Come back, unfaithful people of Israel,’ says the Lord.
[click]    ‘I will stop being angry at you,
because I am full of mercy,’ says the Lord.
    ‘I will not be angry with you forever.
All you have to do is admit your sin—
    that you turned against the Lord your God
and worshiped gods under every green tree
    and didn’t obey me,’” says the Lord.

[slide 5] “Come back to me, you unfaithful children,” says the Lord, “because I am your master. I will give you new rulers who will be true to me, who will lead you with knowledge and understanding. In those days they will not follow their hard, evil hearts anymore.

“I, the Lord, said,

[slide 6] ‘How happy I would be to treat you as my own children
    and give you a pleasant land,
    a land more beautiful than that of any other nation.’
I thought you would call me ‘My Father’
    and not turn away from me.
[slide 7] But family of Israel, you have left me,” says the Lord.

This is what the Lord says to the people of Judah and to Jerusalem:

Give yourselves to serving the Lord,
    and decide to obey him,
[slide 8] If you don’t, my anger will spread among you like a fire,
    and no one will be able to put it out,
    because of the evil you have done.

Talk:

Instead of reading my Bible for the last few mornings I’ve been watching TV instead.  I’m a big fan of cartoons and I just can’t get enough!  But it’s got so that I’m spending more time watching cartoons than anything else – so much so I think I only spoke to God for a quick minute and watched cartoons for nearly 1 hour!

Well last Sunday we heard that we all do this – we all put things in front of God, sometimes we think friends, TV, games, our homes and even our schools are better than God. 

God’s people Judah had said the thing they should spend most of their time with, the thing they should love most was...  not God, but other gods.

So instead of being God’s friends, they made friends with gods that were nothing!  It’s as if God had become boring, and nothing to them. 

Not only that, but they hadn’t done the things God had asked them to do and they had forgotten God.  Instead of loving God and wanting to give their lives and all they had to Him, they had given their lives and all they had to other gods who were nothing! 

Have two watches, one working and one not.  Explain following other gods would be like wearing a watch that doesn’t work...it may look good but it’s useless. 

Well Jeremiah tells Judah this is really silly!   That’s because saying no to the only amazing true God, and yes to other gods is falling for a lie. 

Other gods and the people that followed them had managed to trick Judah into thinking they were better than the real God. 

But we know God is King of everyone and everything – to say He’s nothing is to make a big mistake.  We know that God made everything in the world, He made us, we can only have our life because of God!  

Also, because God gives us everything, only God can give us life.  So it really is silly to turn away from Him. 

But I wonder, have we ever fallen for that lie too?  Have we thought games, TV, even friends and family are more important than God? Have we spent more time with them and sometimes no time with God? 

And following things other than God means that we can’t be friends with God.  So not only is it silly, but it’s unsafe!

Imagine your best friend, you know, it’s the one who you are with everyday, the one who you tell everything and share all you have with.  Imagine one day you started to treat a stranger like that and ignore your real best friend! 

Your best friend would soon realise you weren’t really friends.  And so God knew that Judah had broken their friendship with Him. 

Well, even though Judah had done this terrible thing, God, in His greatness and kindness sends Jeremiah to warn them!  He says to Jeremiah “tell my people Judah to return, look back at who I am!”  God wants them to realise where they are going wrong and return to Him. 

Illustrate going in the wrong direction and getting into trouble, then being given a map and compass and a friend to show you the way back home

But why? If Judah are having fun and enjoying life why should they return to God?! 

Well it’s because God and God only can give us life.  I know we have life now, right here, but God is the only one who gives real-forever-amazing life.  In fact, God is the only One who can save us from death.

Also God promises Judah happiness if they return to Him.  And I don’t mean the happiness we feel when we watch cartoons or play a good game, I mean real true happiness, the kind of happiness that means whatever happens God can be trusted, it will turn out well in the end, forever. 

Well Jesus has come to tell us the same message.  Jesus tells all people everywhere to return to His Father, to be friends with God and put Him first. 

We all need to listen to Judah’s message because we all need to realise where we’ve gone wrong and return to God’s ways.  And it’s because of Jesus and His work on the cross that God can forgive those times when we’ve let things be more important than Him.

But why should we bother?  If we’re having fun now surely that’s what really matters, the here and now? 

But... if we look back to who God is, it means we can have God as our friend, someone we can trust, someone we can say thank you too, someone who we can ask for help and know that He will give us everything we ever need and never leave us.   

Well, in the light of that. I think I need to listen to Jeremiah!  I think I need to return to God, and start spending time with Him again and less time with cartoons.  And the amazing thing is, that if I ask, God will help me to do this! 

Pray

Table Time:

Funsheets

Questions:

Put pictures of story in order in the group. As you do ask some of the following questions.

Knowledge

• What did God do to Israel? Why?

• What was God’s warning to Judah?

• What was God’s good promise?

Understanding

• Was ‘just doing the right things’ good enough for God? [This may be too hard]

• Has God changed in how He deals with sin?

• What would Judah have to do to take up God’s kind invitation?

Application

• What should you do when you realise you’ve made something or someone more important than God?

Spare games:

Learn memory verse – Jeremiah 31:34

all people will know me,
    from the least to the most important,” says the Lord.
“I will forgive them for the wicked things they did,
    and I will not remember their sins anymore.” (NCV)