My wife and I teach Sunday School and Youth Groups and we've put together teaching notes and lesson plans based on good books. Please feel free to read and use them.
STRANGER ON THE ROAD TO EMMAUS (Teaching the Gospel chronologically)
Teaching the Gospel chronologically is one of the most effective ways to provide an unbeliever a solid understanding of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Jesus himself taught chronologically almost 2000 years ago as he walked with Cleopas and the other disciple on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:13-27). What exactly did he do? He taught the gospel message of the Bible by covering the foundational stories chronologically. He simply explained God's story from Creation to the resurrection.
Teaching chronologically allows people with no knowledge of God or the Bible to build their understanding of God and his gospel in building blocks. We start with who God is, and why he undertook the act of creation and each further story builds upon truths learnt in previous lessons until the listener gains a full understanding of the gospel message.
These lessons plans are based on the book The Stranger on the Road to Emmaus by John Cross. They include activities, games, skits, stories, object lessons and other ideas to help make teaching the Bible more effective. The lessons work well especially those aged 11-18. Feel free to use the material and adapt them to your needs. They have been planned to work as they are and should take 25 to 30 90-minute sessions to go through. You can also break up the lessons into smaller-sized sessions.
All the lessons are packaged into a zip file. There are two zip files each containing lessons in a different format: docx (these have been saved to still be compatible with Office 2003) and pdf (in case you can't open the docx format). Select the zip file you want and right click and download.
Also, you can download the additional posters zip files and the other files to add in your lessons. The posters are especially helpful in recapping lessons and for building the gospel story visually. Print them out and put them up on your classroom walls as the lessons progress. They are good for recapping too. The other materials are those that we've found to be helpful in teaching the lessons.
Lesson Files
- View all the following files on one page.
- Stranger Lessons in docx format. (A zip file containing 25 lessons and notes.)
- Stranger Lessons in PDF. (A zip file containing 25 lessons and notes.)
- Posters for Stranger lessons (A zip file of posters in jpeg format.)
- Tabernacle pictures (A zip file containing photos of the Tabernacle.)
- Passover goat sacrifice (An MP4 file.)
- Trip Through the Cosmos (An MP4 file showing how large the universe is. Good for giving students an idea of how vast eternity is.)
- Ark Comparison Animation (A flash [swf] file that compares the size of the Ark to more familiar objects.
- The Lamb Camp materials (Zip file containing materials for teaching kindergarten aged children the Gospel chronologically. Materials were developed by the team at Goodseed.com and is based on The Lamb, the young children's version of The Stranger. The files contains teaching ppts, games, activities and more.)
WALKING STRONG (Follow-up to The Stranger)
After teaching the gospel chronologically, what's next? For new believers, they need to have a good understanding of how God the Holy Spirit worked in their hearts to give them salvation, and how they are to live their lives walking strong in the Lord. This series of lessons will help to do just that.
The series begins by teaching about the Holy Spirit's role their spiritual birth and how they are now—to paraphrase Paul—a new man still battling the old man within. Students are taught how to "work out their salvation" by imitating Christ. There are lessons on how to really study the Bible, how to pray and how to grow by being an active member of a church community. Also included is how to battle sin, how to recover from failures and most importantly, how to focus on our life's goal of expanding the kingdom of God through missions. Through games, object lessons, movies, deep Bible teaching and learning from the testimonies of other faithful Christians, the lessons will help build a strong foundation for new believers.
The lessons were written for 12-14 year old students and build upon the knowledge learnt from The Stranger. Two movies are incorporated into the lessons on prayer, Bible reading and missions. These are "Robber of the Cruel Streets" (about the life of George Muller) and "End of the Spear" about the life of Steve Saint, son of Nate Saint (who was one of five missionaries along with Jim Elliot speared by tribal people in the jungles of Ecuador in 1956).
Note: These lessons are still being "field-tested" so if you try them out, please do let me know how they are. Thank you.
Lesson Outline
- The revolution (What did Jesus come to do?)
- Your freedom (What did Jesus come to restore?)
- Finally alive (Spiritual birth is coming alive)
- The battle begins (New man vs the old man)
- Practise the Presence (Be in God's presence all the time)
- Don't waste your life (What's the point of life on earth)
- Work out your salvation (Battling sin in your life)
- Eat this book (Bible reading)
- Get R.I.P.E (Learning from the Bible)
- Prayer is a love relationship
- Best prayer ever
- Prayer roadblocks
- George Muller - Part 1 (Testimony of prayer and Bible reading)
- George Muller - Part 2
- What is the church?
- Pictures of the early church
- What's a Methodist?
- Now, discover your gifts (Spiritual gifts)
- Your mission is... (Our life's goal)
- Missionaries in all shapes and sizes (We are all missionaries)
- End of the spear (Life of Steve Saint) - Part 1
- End of the spear (Life of Steve Saint) - Part 2
- Telling your story (How to write your testimony)
Lesson Files
- Walking Strong Lesson plans (A zip file containing all 23 lessons in docx format.)
BIG TRUTHS (Follow-up to Walking Strong)
How do we overcome the half-hearted followers of Christ among the children and youth in our church today? What is it that makes these young Christians lukewarm? Answer: a lack of solid understanding about who God truly is and how he is sovereign, in control of history, in control of our lives, and wants us to draw close to him so that we can find our true joy when we worship God, the true treasure of the universe.
Big Truths is a teaching series for 13-20 year-olds. It is inspired by the book Big Truths for Young Hearts by Bruce A. Ware. The lessons reveal God as he reveals himself in Scripture. The lessons systematically teach about God and contrasts it with the false ideas that the world (and indeed, many Christians) have of him. Using a lot of Scripture, taught systematically, and supplemented with games, object lessons, skits, activities and demonstrations, Big Truths will reveal the true God of the Bible and help young Christians marvel at how awesome the one true God really is.
Lesson Outline
- God talks and God shows
- God is God with and without us
- What makes God God
- God: All-powerful, All-wise, All-good
- God the Trinity and the Father
- Who is the Son and who is the Holy Spirit
- The relationship between Father, Son and Holy Spirit
- God is in full control of the world - Part 1
- God is in full control of the world - Part 2
- Pain and suffering in the world God controls
- Angels, Demons & Satan
- Man in the image of God
- Q&A on the Doctrine of Man (Marriage and sexuality)
- Q&A on the Doctrine of Man (Biblical manhood and womanhood)
- Man and sin
- Who is Jesus
- Jesus' sinless life
- Jesus and the cross
- Jesus the victor
- The Holy Spirit in the Old Testament
- The Spirit given to all believers
- The Spirit unites believers
- What must I do to be saved?
- Made more like Christ for good works
- Is there really no other way except through Christ?
- Salvation: God chooses, man chooses
- Assurance of salvation
- More to come...
Lesson Files (All in docx format and in zip files.)
- Lessons 1 - 27 are available here.
- More lessons coming...
