Monthly Archives: June 2015

Worship is pure or base as the worshiper entertains high or low thoughts of God.

For this reason the gravest question before the Church is always God Himself, and the most portentous fact about any man is not what he at a given time may say or do, but what he in his deep heart conceives God to be like…

That our idea of God correspond as nearly as possible to the true being of God is of immense importance to us.

Head → Heart→ Hands→ Habitat

or another way of stating it…

Knowing → Loving → Living →Transforming

The mind’s understanding (knowing the truth) is necessary for the heart’s engagement with that truth (loving the truth). Knowing the truth provides the possibility and basis for loving the truth.

• With children, the first priority in what we can assist them with is the “head”–knowing

When teaching Sunday school, there are two main pillars to the class time: teaching and application. Application is an essential step to apply truths from the Bible lesson to a child’s everyday life. The Small Group Application section of each lesson provides small group leaders with specific questions to discuss with the children in their group. These questions help children understand and clarify what they heard in the lesson and lead them towards three responses:

• The Head: What the children know and understand.
• The Heart: What the children feel, such as emotions, desires and convictions.
• The Hands: What action the children will take, such as a response, commitment, etc.

One of the major updates we made to the revised version of Faithful to All His Promises, was to rework the application section. The questions were expanded and finessed to equip small group leaders with material that is age appropriate, integrated with workbook activities and targeted towards the heart. Here is a sample application section from Faithful to All His Promises, along with the matching workbook pages so you can take a look inside the curriculum and see the changes!

Lesson 7 Promise: God Will Forgive You

Main Ideas:

• If we confess our sins, God will forgive us.
• When God forgives sin, He blots

Small Group Application

• All about the Bible
• What God has done
• Who God is
• The problem of sin

This is my simple agenda to ensure I am actively and intimately involved in the lives of my children: Read, Pray, Work, Play. I must read God’s Word to and with my children regularly. We must bear each others’ burdens in prayer and worship the Lord together at His throne of grace. My children need my positive, encouraging involvement in their work (and they need an invitation into some of mine). And we need to bind our hearts with laughter and joy in shared play, both one-on-one and as a complete family. This all requires time, for time is the currency with which I purchase the right to say, “My son, my daughter, give me your heart.”

It's finally here! After over a year of hard work from the entire Children Desiring God team, we are excited to announce that the revised Faithful to All His Promises is officially released! If you are new to this curriculum, Faithful to All His Promises is a Sunday school curriculum targeted toward 2nd grade children that helps them learn what God has promised believers and unbelievers and teaches them to trust God to always keep His promises. We do not deserve these promises, but they are priceless gifts God has given us. Our prayer is that when children find themselves experiencing troubles—both everyday battles of faith and the very hard battles of life—they will turn to the promises of God and trust that He is working to fulfill His precious promises. If you have been teaching Faithful to All His Promises already, you will love the enhancements we have made to the curriculum. Here are a couple of our favorite updates to the revised curriculum:

Jesus described the Fatherhood of God by noting that no one, not even an evil person, would give his son a serpent when he asked for a fish (Matt. 7:10). Why not? It’s because natural affection propels a father to seek to protect his child from something harmful.

Sadly, though, we see a culture, even among Christians all too often, that is willing to give a child a serpent, as long as he really wants it. After all, all his friends have access to venomous reptiles and we don’t want him to feel different. Plus, we think he’s trustworthy as a snake-charmer.

Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.

Christians parent with one eye on eternity. Their children will live forever. This is a staggering thought…Therefore, the Christian does not parent for this life only. The believing parent labors to prepare each child for the day of judgment. The stakes are inexpressibly high…  

Christian parents have one goal during this short window of opportunity. It is to transfer the baton of faith in Christ to