Advent begins this Sunday!
For 2020, the year of the Nashville tornado, worldwide pandemic, and national elections, we are focusing on God’s sovereignty.
We’ll begin every week with a reading of Psalm 33. Then we’ll define the word sovereign (and practice saying it) as “having supreme or ultimate power.”
Our focus for this week is the affirmation that God is sovereign over creation.
The Jesus Storybook Bible is our go-to for Advent, because as the subtitle says, “every story whispers his name.” We’ll read the introduction to set the stage, then use Gerald McDermott’s picture book, Creation to retell and act out the story of Genesis 1.
The Psalmists were the poets and musicians of their day. Many of the songs they wrote were about nature. They didn’t have copies of the Bible that they could hold and read but instead looked at the world around them to learn about God. We’ll ask the kids to listen for what the psalmist was learning about God when he wrote Psalm 24:1-5.
Questions* we may ask to guide our conversation:
· Where do we see evidence that God is in control of nature/creation?
· When might we have a hard time believing that he is in control?
· What might it mean when it says in verse 5 that “the God who redeems will right what has been wrong”?
We’ll sing songs like Psalm 95 (Come Let Us Sing) and He’s Got the Whole World in his Hands then give the option of writing a psalm or painting a picture that tells of God’s sovereignty over creation.
*Note: It’s important for us not to stick to the questions and answers that are easy or make us feel good. Sometimes, it feels terrible not to be in control. We hate it when God doesn’t do what we want him to. Submission is hard. We want our kids to hear us struggling and leaning into the mystery of faith even in the midst of that struggle.