Week 3 - Struggling with Speech

Schedule of Activities

Registration in the lobby (starting at 6:45 PM)
Songs in the auditorium
Introduction for the night, with rules, points, and kids’ songs
Special Story (dismiss Tiny Trackers — 4-5 yrs)
Game Time (7:25 PM)
Restroom Break & Trivia (7:40 PM)
Bible Lesson (8:00 PM)
Training Time (Table Time, 8:00 PM)
Dismissal (8:15 PM)

Theme of the Night

The words that I blurt can help or hurt!

By the end of the night, the kids should understand that our words are very powerful. They can be used to help people—encouraging, reminding, telling the truth, teaching—or they can be used to hurt people—lying, cursing, spreading gossip, fighting. God gave us all mouths to help others, and when we do so we can glorify Him

Memory Verse for Scripture Spies - Psalm 19:14 - “Let the words of my mouth, And the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord.”

Memory Verse for Faith Force - Ephesians 4:29 - “Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers. “

Special Story - led by Lucie Knight

For the special story time, Lucie can choose from the two options that our curriculum provides:

She can tell a story about a kid who lies at school and cannot escape conviction
She can do an object lesson, where the truth (an alka-seltzer tablet) is eaten away by lies (water in a glass)

Game Time led by Graham Plikerd

Graham’s leading the game time tonight. I’ll put more stuff in here when he gets it to me.

Bible Story - David and Abigail - 1 Samuel 25

Have you ever used the wrong tool for doing something?

View full lesson

Maybe you were writing something down and you used a pen instead of a pencil, so you couldn’t erase it when you messed up. Or maybe you wanted to inflate your football, but you tried using your mouth instead of a pump. Sometimes the wrong tool will cause more harm than good—like if you tried to inflate your football with the pump for your car tires.

Visual 1 - Show pictures of these “wrong tools,” and have the kids say “Help” or “Hurt” when they see them

David was on the run. God had told him that one day he’d be king, but there was already a king—an evil man named Saul who wanted to kill David. David had been doing everything right, serving in the army, helping protect the people in the country, and even helping the king whenever he could. But now he couldn’t stay in the same spot for too long or Saul would have him killed.

For a while, David was hiding out in some mountain ranges called Carmel—but this was no land of sticky sweet ice cream toppings. There were dangerous bandits and animals around, so David and the soldiers with him did what they always did. They protected the people from the dangers. Some of the people were these sheep-shearing men who worked for a rich guy called Nabal.

Visual 2 - Show picture of the soldiers and the sheep shearers

A special holiday was coming up, and David knew that he and his soldiers would need some food. He didn’t have any, but they thought that maybe Nabal would share some since they’d protected his sheep and shearers from all the dangers in Carmel. David sent some soldiers to Nabal with the message. But Nabal was angry and said very angry and hurtful words to the soldiers. So the soldiers came back to David.

Did Nabal’s words help or hurt?

Visual 3 - 1 Samuel 25:13 - “And David said unto his men, “Gird ye on every man his sword.”

What Nabal did was wrong. God had said that David was going to be king, and Nabal should have been kind to him! But Nabal didn’t care about what God said, he just cared about himself. David was so angry that he gathered all his soldiers together to go up and punish Nabal.

Visual 4 - Picture of Abigail and David

When Abigail, Nabal’s wife, heard about all the problems, she decided to meet with David. She brought food for David’s men and she spoke kind words to him. She asked David to forgive their family for sinning against David. She spoke about the LORD and how He was in control of everything. Abigail spoke words that helped David and that helped protect her husband and the sheep business—nobody go hurt because Abigail was a peace maker!

Visual 5 - 1 Samuel 25:24 - “Upon me let this iniquity be.”

Did Abigail’s words help or hurt?

Because of Abigail’s kind words, David did not go up to fight against Nabal. But Nabal still displeased God.

Visual 6 - Main Point - “The words I blurt can help or hurt.”

Your words come out of your mouth. They show everybody what you’re thinking about. All people have a problem with sin, and so all people have a problem with speaking sinful things. We need God to come into our hearts to change us, to clean us—and that starts with agreeing with God that you’re a sinner, and then repenting of your sin and asking Him to save you!

But Nabal didn’t change his mind. He didn’t ask God for forgiveness. And only ten days after David left, God punished Nabal for his sin and he died.

Training Time (Girls)

Teachers, feel free to adapt the table time to fit what you think your group needs.

Group Activity: Bring in blocks or boxes to make a tower. (I have a Jenga set that you can use if you’d like!) Have the kids each name something kind they could say and then help “build up” the tower of encouragement by stacking the blocks. For example, you could say, “God loves you,” and then add your block to the tower. But then (teacher) give an example of something hurtful that you could say and then pull out one of the bottom blocks to cause the tower to come down. Use this to illustrate the effect of helpful or hurtful speech.

Scripture Study: Read James 3:2-8 and ask the following questions as the kids color their pictures.

What examples does God use to help us understand the power of words?
How does a rudder steer a ship?
How can something you say “steer” someone to do something?
How does a bit (or a harness) control a horse?
How can something you say control someone else?
What happens to a fire when it gets out of control?
What happens when to other people when we talk in a hurtful way (lying, gossip, angry talking)?

Prayer: Use your words to pray for people. Write down some people in need of encouragement, make some suggestions of how the kids could encourage those people, and then have the children pray for them.

Training Time (Boys)

I’m going to go through an exercise demonstrating that God’s Men use their muscles to rescue and protect — and the one of their most powerful muscles is their tongue.

First I’m going to have them name superheroes and describe what they use their powers to do. Next, I’ll have them name real-life superheroes (I’ll name a few like William Carey—who taught people in India that killing wives when their husbands die was wrong; William Wilberforce—who convinced the people in England that slavery should be outlawed; and Martin Luther King Jr.—who encouraged Americans to find peaceful ways to end racial tension).

Then, I’m going to do a game with the boys where I’ll test their impulses. They’ll stand in a circle, and I’m going to either throw the ball to them or just fake it. If they flinch when I fake it, they lose one of their three points, or if they fail to catch the ball when when I throw it they lose a point. The application is that our impulses can’t be trusted—we have to think through what we are going to do with Spirit-led minds rather than going with our gut.

After this, I’ll try to train them in the verses while they eat their snack or color. We’ll close in prayer.