Once again we’ll begin with a reading of Psalm 33.
For the third week of Advent, we’ll use the stories of the past weeks (the Israelite’s exodus from Egypt, David’s anointing, and the Babylonian captivity) to learn about God’s sovereignty over nations and rulers. It will be important (especially for our ten-year old) to make it clear that this doesn’t mean God will always do what we want or even that he’ll always make the path easy for us.
He gave the Israelites judges but other nations had kings and the Israelites wanted to be like everyone else. God gave them what they asked for, even when he knew it wasn’t a good idea. They wanted the biggest, strongest man with the biggest sword to conquer other nations. God chose the shepherd, David, because he had the right heart. Eventually, the Israelite’s disregard for God’s law resulted in their exile to Babylon. When the people start looking for a savior, again they expected a mighty warrior, but Jesus came in the form of a tiny baby.
God is sovereign over the nations. There is nothing happening on earth that he is unaware of, and the Bible says he hears our cries. The hard lesson for us is that his sovereignty might not look the way we expect.
We’ll close our time with a simple craft. The kids will glue a color print-out of the earth into the center of a paper then put (washable paint) handprints over it. We’ll sing He’s Got the Whole World in his Hands and include verses for our current and former hometowns/states, our local and national leaders, and the Philippines (home of our Compassion kids).