Has anyone else noticed that Sunday school materials seem to be heavy on the OT heroes and scant on the NT?
I noticed that in our church we seem to focus on Christmas and Easter with some OT heroes in-between, and then maybe some general topics like friendship, the fruits of the Spirit, etc.
But what about the first church, the first martyrs, the epistles, ...Revelation?
I opened up my craft book to take a look at the repertoire. After the Resurrection there is a small section titled "Christian Life." That is the extent of the material pertaining to everything after the Gospels.
To be fair, there ARE selected stories that are usually covered: Pentecost, Ananias and Sapphira, Paul's conversion, and Paul and Silas in jail. Other stories might be used to illustrate more general topics such as church fellowship. But there is so much more!
We wanted to do a short survey on the books of the NT as an introduction, but it is hard to find materials on the General Epistles, for example. Or maybe I am just not looking in the right place?
Maybe you should write one, your "free time' of course! Most children's story bibles don't even have much on the Epistles so good luck.
ReplyDeleteThis was one problem Polly had growing up in the Congregational Church as they taught almost everything through OT stories. (Some of those would be tough to share with children.) She had no understanding of the NT until attending a chapel service conducted by a young Lutheran minister. It changed her life. Since kids, or at least some of them, seem to know the OT, the most important thing a teacher could do is show the connection with the NT. So if you have materials already set for OT, build that bridge to the NT. Most of the letters of Paul deal with Salvation through Grace and not through works, so to contrast this with the Law should be an easy task for you.
ReplyDeleteI don't mind writing plans, but time restraints and the Russian language do pose a challenge. :)
ReplyDeleteHosea, that's a good idea to build a bridge. In Hebrews, for example, there are the men of faith. I just want to do an overview right now and then maybe we can go through the NT again with maps and more details.
Maps are a good idea. My men's group just finished up on Gideon in Judges. Having a map showing the towns and Jordon valley helped me see clearly the tasks he and his 300 men had before them. Plus, I really like maps.
ReplyDeleteДа, действительно программы в большинстве своем вехозаветно-ориентированные.
ReplyDeleteМожет, дело в том, что создатели пытались построить уроки для детей на основе ярких жизненных историй?
Hosea, if you have any online map resources, I think I could put them to use. :)
ReplyDeleteНаверное, детям лучше что-нибудь рассказывать, и структура исторических книг уже похожа на рассказ. А в посланиях, кто-то учит других чему-то. Это более абстрактно. Ну и о пророках тоже мало говорим. Исаию, например, не проходили еще. :)
Но в Деяниях, и т.д. тоже есть история. Просто, нужно материалы подобрать. Если будем на Воскресной школе изучать историю Церкви, было бы интересно это делать с детьми параллельно.
I have used recently http://biblos.com/ , which has an Atlas and is pretty good with maps. There is a learning curve to the site as there are so many buttons/links. There are lots of other sites. Also, I don't know the source of this site, but as always on the Net, be alert.
ReplyDeleteThanks! It looks like there are lots of good visuals.
ReplyDelete