Lesson: Our faith comes from before Jesus
Bible Lesson: Matthew 5:17-20
Show the children a plant, large enough to be easily seen.
“This plant is our faith – Christianity. Christians like us follow the teaching of Jesus the Messiah — Jesus the Christ. Christ means Messiah. But Jesus didn’t just invent this religion for us to follow. Jesus took the words of his father, Creator God, and told us to follow the spirit of God’s laws. In that time, everyone was following the word of God’s law and less so the spirit. These folks, who lived in Jesus’ time and are our brothers and sisters today, are the foundation of our faith. As I said, this beautiful plant is our faith. But our faith is nothing (pull plant out of pot to reveal the roots) without the roots from which it came. In our case, these roots are Judaism, a belief we study in what we call the Old Testament of the Bible. Any more than this plant can’t have it’s beauty without the roots, neither can we have our faith without the roots that came before us, the roots of Judaism. That is why we study all the books of our Bible – the Old and the New Testament, so we can better understand and to God’s work.