Sunday 31 January 2021 - Trust God
Choosing to Trust God
Worship:
Listen to the amazing promise in the words of the worship song ‘Every Step’ by Nick and Becky Drake and join the Rainford Family who have come up with some cool actions to help you remember it:
Word:
Read Jeremiah chapter 29, verses 11 and 13 (with older children compare it in different versions).
These often-quoted verses sum up so much about God in just a few words. It shows how precious we are to God, how special! God cares deeply about all of us and knows all about us - He loves us so much! God also knows all about our lives (everything). He also has great plans for our futures - we have to choose to follow God’s plans and we do that by learning to listen and tune into God’s will for our lives. But God always wants what is best for us - He wants us to be happy, to have peace, to enjoy life, to have hope.
Let’s be honest though, things don’t always go great! For example, how it is really hard at present due to lockdown because of Coronavirus; we can’t do all the things we’d like to be able to (like go to school, see family and friends, do our fun activities etc). Talk with your family about what you are finding difficult and what other people are going through.
When you read around the chosen verses of the rest of the book of Jeremiah, we realise that actually the people that God is talking to - the Israelites are going through a really tough time! They are homeless, they’ve been driven from their homeland, they’ve lost everything - their houses, their land, and then along comes Jeremiah (a prophet) who tells them all: ‘I have good plans for you. I don’t plan to hurt you. I plan to give you hope and a good future…’ To be honest, they probably felt far from hopeful and happy!
Talk together about how God never said that our lives would be easy. But whatever is happening, even when times are hard, when we are sad or in pain, the best choice we can make is to trust God, to find ways of living well, of living how Jesus showed us to live in the Gospels. The promise from God is that wherever we find ourselves, we can choose to stay close to God and have His peace and help through the difficulties. Find examples in scripture, like John 16:33 / Isaiah 41: 10 / Romans 15: 13 / 1 Peter 1 that also show how we can choose to trust God in all circumstances.
Activity suggestions:
Under 5’s
Choose a family-favourite Bible verse about trusting in God and have a go at learning it together. You might choose to create actions to enable active learning and make it easier to remember. (If you are musical, you might even want to create a tune to sing along to too!)
5-11’s
Choose a family-favourite Bible verse(s) about trusting in God and write it out on a large piece of paper – you might choose to use bubble lettering or a stencil. (Alternatively you might use word art and print out the verse.)
Colour the verse in and decorate around the verses. Use this time to pray and thank God that we can choose to trust Him because He only wants what is best for us.
Stick the verse up in your home (you could even frame it). Reading it will be helpful on the days when you’re not feeling so positive!
If you prefer, you could print out a pre-prepared colouring sheet, like the one in the separate ‘Jeremiah 29 v11 Colouring’ PDF.
Reflection:
Sometimes parts of scripture are put to music and this can help you to reflect on them or even to memorise them. You might like to listen to this catchy version of Jeremiah 29: 11 by Jared Rich performed for Saddleback Kids and think about the following questions:
- I wonder how these verses make you feel?
- I wonder what you need to trust to God?
- I wonder what God’s ‘future plans for good’ are in your life?