Welcome back! I hope August went well for everyone and if your kids started school that everything is going well. I now have a kindergartner and a preschooler which means 3 days a week I have almost 2 hours to myself. It’s AMAZING!!!!
Funny story from last month. I guess it was the end of July when we did the story about the snake biting Paul, but Paul wasn’t hurt. The kids have LOVED playing this over and over and over again. They were playing it together and my son said to his little sister, “I’ll be Paul, and you can be…John.” She responded, “No, I’m Mary!” And then they proceeded to bite each other with a snake toy and shout, “Ahh….go away snake!” As they shake it off their arm unharmed. We’ve had a few discussion about how we need to make sure we are still safe and careful around snakes in the wild, but it’s so great to see that this is actually sinking in- even though they frequently grump about getting started!
I stopped adding the section with corresponding children’s scriptures. Sorry about that. There’s just nothing available 😦 We’ve started just reading either a Book of Mormon scripture story at night, or reading from the friend, or just whatever the kids request. There is a Friend Jr. story on Paul’s letters in the September Friend so definitely check that one out.
September 2-8 God Is Not the Author of Confusion, but of Peace
Song: I Lived in Heaven pg. 4
Materials: Plan of Salvation Printable
Explain the plan of Salvation using drawings. There are a lot of examples online, you can draw as you go, or I’ve created a very simple printable for you. Emphasize the degrees of glory described in 1 Cor 15:40-41.
Before you get started, have them draw clothes on the blank (physical body) person, and consider putting their picture on the face.
Pre-earth life- Put the little spirit character on the Pre-Earth cloud, explain that we were spirits living with our Heavenly Father, but in order to become like him we would need to gain a body and make good choices.
Earth- Heavenly Father and Jesus created the earth for us so that we could gain a body, put the physical body on top of the spirit character, then explain that while we are here we need to make good choices. Talk about a few good choices you need to make (baptism, going to church, hands to self, listening to parents, etc.)
Death- Some day we will die and our body will stay in the ground (put the grave next to the earth and the body there) but our spirit will go to the Spirit world (move the spirit to the spirit world) where we will wait to be resurrected.
Resurrection- move the body and spirit back together and explain that when we are resurrected our bodies will be PERFECT! No more sickness or pain.
Judgement- explain that Heavenly Father and Jesus will ask us how we did listening to them, following them, and fixing things when we make mistakes. That will determine where we go.
Celestial- if we do the best we can do with Jesus helping us then we can go to the Celestial Kingdom to be with Heavenly Father and our families FOREVER! It’s so beautiful Paul said it was like the sun.
Terrestrial- this is for people that were very nice but didn’t follow Jesus all the way. It’s still really lovely there, but not the best. Paul related it to the moon.
Telestial- this is for people who made bad choices and didn’t try to fix them. They will still be happy, but not as much as the other two. Paul said it was like the stars. Talk about how the Sun, Moon, and Stars give off different amounts of light.
Side note- you can help kids remember the order with Sea Turtle- C Ter Tel
September 9-15 Be Ye Reconciled to God
Song: Faith pg. 96
Materials: Blindfold, objects such as toys, treats, scriptures, picture of Christ
Hide a few items around a room- some things just for fun and some things like scriptures, picture of Christ, etc. Take turns being blindfolded and having the other family members tell the person blindfolded where to go to find the objects. Explain that while we are on earth we can’t see Heavenly Father or Jesus, but if we listen to the Spirit, and the words of the Prophets then we can find our way back.
September 16-22 God Loveth a Cheerful Giver
Song: Army of Helaman pg. 172
Materials: Fort building materials (couch cushions, chairs, blankets, sheets, etc.), Nerf guns and/or other soft ammo (pillows, paper airplanes, crumbled paper rocks, etc.) Righteous ammo printable
Explain that we are in a war against wickedness. Wickedness is making choices that go against what Heavenly Father wants for us like taking bad things into our bodies, using our bodies to hurt people, hurting our own bodies, not listening to our parents, making things more important than Heavenly Father, etc. Talk about what we can do to combat the bad things. Reading scriptures, going to church, serving people, listening, watching good shows, etc. You can either just show the Righteous ammo printable or cut out the pictures and tape them to your ammo. Build a fort together and talk about how we want to make our home like a fort against bad things in the world. Gather in the fort together but leave one parent out to be the opposing side. Use your righteous ammo to defend your fort and take down the “bad guy.”
Additional Activity: To go along with the ammo of helping people, think of someone you can serve CHEERFULLY! This could be as simple as coloring a picture for someone in the ward who is sick, lonely, new, etc. Or taking some donations somewhere. Always good to find a simple service project for the kids!
September 23-29 Walk in the Spirit
Song: The Holy Ghost pg. 105
Materials: 9 pieces of Fruit (try to get a good variety, but you might want to go ahead and double up on some favorites), other ingredients for your fruit salad/pizza/smoothie, Fruits of the Spirit
Use the Fruits of the Spirit printable to label fruit with the different fruits of the spirit discussed in Galatians 5:22-23
Talk through the different fruits and what they mean:
Love- we feel and show love for others when we are kind to them and serve them. What makes you feel loved?
Joy- joy is happiness and a good attitude when things don’t go your way
Peace- we use kind words without yelling, we listen to others when it is their turn to talk
Longsuffering- we are patient, we wait our turn
Gentleness- we use our hands for helping not for hurting, if you or someone else makes a mistake we let them fix it
Goodness- we keep the commandments from Heavenly Father and follow the rules at home and school
Faith- we believe in Jesus and keep learning about him
Meekness- we are willing to listen and fix things when Mom or Dad or a teacher tells us how things need to be done, even if it’s different than how you want to do it
Temperance- we take good care of our bodies
Now use the fruit to make something yummy like a fruit salad, a fruit pizza, or a smoothie.
September 30- October 13 For the Perfecting of the Saints
I’m going to actually post the specifics of this with October, especially since this covers 2 weeks because of General conference. But you’re going to need some supplies so you might want to start thinking about that now.
This chunk will cover the Apostasy and Restoration- you’re going to need a Jenga tower that you don’t mind writing on. I found an adorable miniature one at the dollar store a couple weeks ago in the toy section. So be on the look out, it’s probably something you can find at a thrift store as well.
It will also cover the Armor of God. I’m really hoping to find a suit of armor to use, which might be easy with Halloween coming up!
Consolidated Materials List:
Plan of Salvation Printable
Blindfold
objects such as toys, treats, scriptures, picture of Christ
Fort building materials (couch cushions, chairs, blankets, sheets, etc.)
Nerf guns and/or other soft ammo (pillows, paper airplanes, crumbled paper rocks, etc.)
Righteous ammo printable
9 pieces of Fruit
other ingredients for your fruit salad/pizza/smoothie
Fruits of the Spirit printable
Be on the look out for a Jenga tower and suit of armor!
Image by HeVoLi from Pixabay
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Stones that shine in darkness 