iConnect Sunday School - Jesus' Miracles (part 1 - Jan. 27)

This week we started our first lesson about Jesus. I LOVE teaching this age group!!! They always want to answer (in fact, if I let everyone answer every question we wouldn't make it into the service), they're not sleepy, they listen to game instructions, and they're just all around fun. Temi joined me this week as a co-teacher because she's on the youth student leadership team and wants to get some experience teaching.

This week and next we are focusing on Jesus's miracles. Obviously he did too many wonderful things to cram into two lessons, so I'm choosing a couple of miracles that represent what he was trying to accomplish in general.

This week we took a look at one of the many times Jesus healed someone on the Sabbath in Luke 6:


A Discussion about the Sabbath

6 One Sabbath day as Jesus was walking through some grainfields, his disciples broke off heads of grain, rubbed off the husks in their hands, and ate the grain. 2 But some Pharisees said, “Why are you breaking the law by harvesting grain on the Sabbath?”

3 Jesus replied, “Haven’t you read in the Scriptures what David did when he and his companions were hungry? 4 He went into the house of God and broke the law by eating the sacred loaves of bread that only the priests can eat. He also gave some to his companions.” 5 And Jesus added, “The Son of Man[a] is Lord, even over the Sabbath.”

Jesus Heals on the Sabbath

6 On another Sabbath day, a man with a deformed right hand was in the synagogue while Jesus was teaching. 7 The teachers of religious law and the Pharisees watched Jesus closely. If he healed the man’s hand, they planned to accuse him of working on the Sabbath.

8 But Jesus knew their thoughts. He said to the man with the deformed hand, “Come and stand in front of everyone.” So the man came forward. 9 Then Jesus said to his critics, “I have a question for you. Does the law permit good deeds on the Sabbath, or is it a day for doing evil? Is this a day to save life or to destroy it?”

10 He looked around at them one by one and then said to the man, “Hold out your hand.” So the man held out his hand, and it was restored! 11 At this, the enemies of Jesus were wild with rage and began to discuss what to do with him.

The focus this week was on how Jesus came to fulfill the law, and part of that was showing everyone that loving and following God is more important than loving and following the law. He respected and obeyed the law, but he did that differently than the religious leaders liked or wanted. It's interesting that while Jesus healed out of love and compassion on the Sabbath, the Pharisees were full of hatred and plotted murder on the Sabbath.

Our lesson included a game about rules that we break or follow, a discussion of the passage, a case study about when it might be worth breaking the rules of friendship, and a short worksheet that we discussed at the end of the class. Students took these sheets home.

Here are some follow up questions:

• Is it ever okay to break the rules? Explain.
• Did Jesus come to get rid of the Old Testament rules?
• Why didn't Jesus just wait a day to avoid the whole Sabbath controversy?
• What is one thing that you are doing to help you love God?
• What is one thing that you are doing that is making it harder to love God?
• What is one thing that you are doing to help you love others?
• What is one thing that you are doing that is making it harder to love others?
• What is one thing you want to do differently this week to love God and others better?