Monday, July 2, 2012

Ministry Minute and the Parenting Place--A 4th of July Devotion for Kids

4th of July...The birthday of our country, a time for celebrating our American freedoms with friends and family, and what a great opportunity to teach our kids about true FREEDOM that comes from knowing and following Christ! 
For this lesson, we used the Scripture found in Galatians 5:1,
"It is for FREEDOM that Christ has set us FREE!"

The supplies were very simple:  a template I made on copy paper with a flag outline on the front and our Bible verse on the back, glue, red paper collage squares, larger blue paper squares, and sheets of foil star stickers.
Our lesson began with a visit from our puppet friend, Penny the Penguin, but you could use any puppet you have available.  As you can see, Penny had been helping Mom at the office and had become quite entangled in the print feed from the computer room.

Penny was very frustrated at this predicament!  I asked Penny if he would like to be free.  Of course, the answer was yes, so the children helped Penny untangle himself.  I used this as an object lesson to launch into our lesson.  Sin can often entangle us and there is only 1 way to break free--to ask God to forgive us and to remove the sin that so easily ensnares us.
Once Penny was free, you can see that he was a much happier penguin!  That is how we also feel when we have been forgiven.  Christ loves us and extends this gift of freedom to us all! 

After the lesson we transitioned to our tables to complete the flag craft using the supplies described above.
For older children, your flag could be more realistic.  My preschoolers were able to do about 10 stars and 3 red stripes unassisted.  Older children could make American flags which were more true to scale with 13 stripes and 50 stars.

I hope you all have a fabulous week of the 4th!  Watch for more goodies from me throughout the week!  Shannon :-)

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