Materials Needed: “Connecting the Presents” cards
FOR THE TEACHER ONLY: This week’s focus is on the gifts of the Holy Spirit. This topic is usually understood more easily than others, as a lot of kids have a good understanding of gifts, so they can more easily understand this analogy. Have fun with this week, as it’s a lighter topic to cover…and who doesn’t like gifts?
I HIGHLY recommend writing 1 Corinthians 12 verses 4, and 8-11 on a big posterboard to refer to while teaching about the gifts of the Holy Spirit so you can keep coming back to it. It makes teaching this lesson much easier for the kids to know when you are reading from this passage.
FOR EVERYONE: Welcome, everyone to week 3 of our Holy Spirit series! This week we get to talk about something that almost everyone likes. By raising your hands, I want to see how many people like getting gifts???? That is a lot of hands!!!
So today we are talking about how the Holy Spirit gives gifts to all those who believe on Jesus.
But before we start talking about this, I want to ask everyone a question. Close your eyes, and I want you to think about the best gift you ever remember getting. Can you see it? Why was it your favorite gift you ever got? I want to hear a few people tell me about their favorite gift and why they liked it so much.
(Listen to a few kids tell about their favorite gift and the reasons why they liked that gift)
Those were some really cool gifts!
So like I said earlier, today we are going to talk about the gifts that the Holy Spirit gives us.
Now, I bet most of you have also received some bad gifts before too, right? Now, do you think God has the ability to give some good gifts? Yeah, if I was wanting to receive a gift from 1 person, it would be God. He is able to give some BIG things.
In fact, it talks in the Bible about how God likes to give us gifts. Jesus was talking to a group of people in the Bible, and told them in Matthew 7:11 “If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!"
So just like parents give their children gifts, God gives His children gifts as well.
So who ARE God’s children?
Romans 8:14 in the Bible says, “For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God.”
So it’s not just “believing that God exists” that makes you his child, it’s letting God lead your life. Even the Devil believes that God exists, but obviously he is not God’s child. When you let God lead you (more specifically when you let the Holy Spirit lead you) you are God’s child. When you do that, God says He will give you gifts. We’re going to talk about some of those gifts today!
So let’s dive in. Jesus said in John 6:63 “The Holy Spirit gives life.” He then later said “The words I have spoken to you are full of the Spirit. They give life.”
So first of all, the Holy Spirit gives us LIFE. Not just being physically alive, like our hearts beating, but fully alive, meaning a life of purpose...a life that has a relationship with God. So that’s the first gift.
On to the 2nd gift. In Ephesians 6:17 it says “Take the sword of the Holy Spirit. The sword is God’s word.”
Wait, so we get a real sword?!?! That’s a cool gift!!!
Well, maybe kids would get hurt. Let’s think about this one for a minute. What are swords meant to do?
Attack.
In the Bible Jesus was tempted by the Devil 3 times in Matthew chapter 4. All three of these times Jesus used Scripture, or Bible verses, to attack the Devil’s temptation. Then the Devil went away. So if that is what Jesus used to attack the Devil when he tempted Him, then that’s what we know will work the best to attack the Devil when he tempts us! And just like you have to pick up a sword and practice using it in order to get good at it, we also have to pick up the Bible and read it in order to know it, so that we can use it when we are tempted by the Devil. Does that make sense?
So the Bible is the Sword of the Holy Spirit.
Alright, what are some other gifts the Holy Spirit gives us? Let’s find out. (Refer to 1 Corinthians posterboard.)
1 Corinthians 12:4 says “There are different kinds of gifts. But they are all given to believers by the same Spirit.”
So the Holy Spirit is in charge of giving out these gifts.
A few verses later it says in verse 8 that “To some people the Spirit gives a message of wisdom.” So here the Holy Spirit may help someone decide how to react to all kinds of situations, like how to act, talk, vote, respond, or even listen in a way that only God would see it, not just doing things based on the way we feel at the time.
Next it says “To others the same Spirit gives a message of knowledge.” Here the Holy Spirit helps you know something that you wouldn’t know otherwise. For instance, the Holy Spirit may help you understand something that most people find hard to understand.
Then it says, “To others the same Spirit gives faith.”
So here the Holy Spirit helps you believe in something that you could not normally see, like trusting in God, who you cannot see with your eyes, but can see the results of, such as His love, His amazing creation, and Him working in ways you cannot describe in your life. Because you cannot see Him but still believe is faith! And the Holy Spirit helps give that to you! Or like believing you can do well on a test because you studied, even though you feel scared and everyone else is scared too. That’s faith, and the Holy Spirit can help you have extra faith when you need it!
Next, it says “To others that one Spirit gives gifts of healing.” This would simply be the healing of something in a way that wouldn’t normally heal on its own. Like if God healed your body from a disease that doctors did not know how to help. But also this could be not only your body, but things like healing your relationships with friends or family, or even your mind in ways nobody else could help heal them.
“To others he gives the power to do miracles.”
The Holy Spirit is who gives the ability to perform things that cannot be performed naturally. The thing we have to remember is that it is up to the Holy Spirit to do this, and it will be to help spread the message of who God is. It’s not you being able to do something miraculous because it is cool, like turning your water into Kool-Aid. That would be nice, though. Miracles do exist, and the Holy Spirit is who causes them.
“To others he gives the ability to prophesy.”
Prophesy is speaking on behalf of God. God used “prophets” in the Bible to help deliver a message. God still uses people to help tell specific messages, and he may use you sometime to tell someone a specific message. That’s what the Holy Spirit does, and it’s really cool when God does this. On another note, you have to be careful if someone says they have message to you from God. People could be lying. What they say has to line up with what the Bible says. God’s message to you will never be something that goes against what the Bible says. Does that make sense?
“To others he gives the ability to tell the spirits apart.”
This one is the ability to tell if something is really of God or not. For example, sometimes people have different motivations for doing things that most people would see as good. Like if someone was giving to others to make themselves look good or to get popular. Or if they did something good in order to help them get lots of money rather than just to help others. The Holy Spirit sometimes help people realize when someone is truly for God or if they are doing “good” things for a “not good” reason.
“To others he gives the ability to speak in different kinds of languages they had not known before.”
The Bible gives 2 types of ways that the Holy Spirit helps people speak in different languages they had not been able to before. The first example is in Acts chapter 2 when people from other countries were around for a huge celebration called the Feast of Pentecost like we talked about last week.
FOR THE TEACHER ONLY: Pentecost means 50 (“Penta” means 5, like the shape pentagon, and “Cost” meaning 0, or breaking even/back to 0, like if you buy something for cost, you paid 0 over what the other person paid for it.) The Feast of Pentecost was celebrated 50 days following Passover (God’s deliverance of Israel from the death plague on Egypt and leading them to freedom). 50 days after each Passover celebration they would celebrate the Feast of Pentecost. This feast focused on God providing for them. It was a holiday where: 1) everyone who celebrated would return to Jerusalem from wherever they moved to in order to celebrate, bringing others from other countries and 2) made land owners who were harvesting crops leave some for the needy. This drew even more people. So a lot of people from all over the world would come to Jerusalem at this time, no doubt representing numerous nations and languages.
FOR EVERYONE: People from all over the world came to celebrate this feast. The Holy Spirit helped His people speak in other languages they didn’t even know so that they could spread the good news about Jesus to people from all over the world. Those other people from different countries could understand them because of what the Holy Spirit helped them do. Then those people who were from other countries and spoke other languages could go back home and spread that news about Jesus to everyone else. This is one of the fastest ways the good news about Jesus was spread, because people didn’t have to translate the message of Jesus to others. The Holy Spirit did that for them while people from all over were all together. That is so amazing!!
The Bible also talks about how the Holy Spirit helps us pray to God more powerfully than we could ever do ourselves. Sometimes we don’t know exactly what to say to God, and that’s okay. That’s when the Holy Spirit can help you.
Jude 20 says “But you, dear friends, build yourselves up in your most holy faith. Let the Holy Spirit guide and help you when you pray.”
Romans 8:26 says “In the same way, the Holy Spirit helps us when we are weak. We don’t know what we should pray for. But the Spirit himself prays for us. He prays through groans too deep for words.”
The Bible talks a lot more about the Holy Spirit helping us pray in 1 Corinthians chapter 14.
Okay, back to our main verses for the day (1 Corinthians chapter 12 passage). The next part of the verses talking about the Holy Spirit’s gifts says “And to still others he gives the ability to explain what was said in those languages.”
So the Holy Spirit also helps to make sure that others understand what is being said about God.
Lastly it says, “All the gifts are produced by one and the same Spirit. He gives gifts to each person, just as He decides.”
So it’s not up to US which gift we receive, it’s up to God. It even says later in 1 Corinthians 12:29-31: “Not all are apostles. Not all are prophets. Not all are teachers. Not all do miracles. Not all have gifts of healing. Not all speak in different languages. Not all interpret those languages. But you should truly want to have the greater gifts.”
So we can, and we should, ask for the better gifts God gives, just like we can ask for really big gifts from our family. Who is going to ask for BIG gifts this coming year for Christmas or your birthday?
But just like it’s up to our family to decide if they think we could really use that gift or not, it’s up to God to decide which gifts He gives us. God knows best. But regardless of which gifts the Holy Spirit gives us, we can bet they will be amazing!
Alright…Review Time!!!!
Question: What does the Holy Spirit give to God’s children?
Answer: Gifts
Question: Is it up to you which Gifts the Holy Spirit gives you?
Answer: No, the Holy Spirit decides which gifts to give you.
Question: Are all the gifts needed to help spread the message of Jesus to the world?
Answer: Yes
Question: What is the “Sword of the Holy Spirit?”
Answer: The Bible
Question: Why is the Bible called the Sword of the Holy Spirit?
Answer: Because that is what Jesus used to fight the temptations of the Devil and that is what we should use to fight back when we are tempted to do wrong.
GREAT JOB EVERYONE!!!!!!
Okay, so that brings us to our object lesson for today. I need some help with some gifts!!!