Use this Sermon on the Mount Sunday School lesson to teach children to keep their word.
Needed: Bibles
Needed: Bibles
Lesson: (Note: Always allow students enough time to think about and answer the questions before clarifying the teaching.)
Ask
students, Can any of you think of a time when someone promised you
something or told you that they were going to do something, but then
didn’t do it? (Allow students to share. If the teacher can think of an
appropriate example when this happened to him or her, they should also
share.)
How did it make you feel when that person broke their promise to you?
Have you ever broken a promise you made to someone?
(Have a student or two read Matthew 5:33-37.)
Jesus
says not to swear. What does it mean to swear? Sometimes swearing means
saying bad words. But swearing also means making promises. Someone
might make a promise by saying, “I swear on my mother’s grave” or “I
swear that if I don’t do something, you can have my favorite toy.”
When
Jesus lived, people swore by things like Heaven and Earth and their
cities and their own heads. They would say things like, “I swear I’ll do
this and if I don’t, then Heaven will come down, or the Earth will
crack, or our city will be destroyed, or my head will fall off.” Do you
think those things would really happen if someone didn’t do what they
said they would? Can you make Heaven come down or make the Earth crack,
or make our city get destroyed, or make your head fall off just by
breaking a promise? Of course not!
Take
a piece of your hair. Pull out just one piece. Now hold that piece of
hair out in front of you and think real hard. Try to make that piece of
hair change to a different color.
You
can’t do it. Jesus says that we shouldn’t swear because we can’t make
things happen. We can’t make Heaven come down or the Earth crack or our
city be destroyed or our head fall off. We can’t even change the color
of our own hair. Only God can do those things! So for us to swear about
them is just silly. And it’s also disrespectful to God because we’re
making it sound like we can do something that only He can do.
So if we shouldn’t swear, what should we do?
(Have another student read Matthew 5:37 again.)
Jesus
says that we should let our “Yes” be yes and our “No” no. That means
that if we say we will do something, we should do it. We don’t have to
swear about it. We don’t have make promises about it. We should just say
if we will do something or not and then make sure we do or don’t do
what we said. If we always do what we say we’re going to do, then people
will know that they can trust us and we won’t have to make promises or
swear for people to believe us.
Remember: Don’t swear, just answer honestly and then do what you said you would. Then people will trust you.
Find more Sunday School lesson ideas on our Free Children Sunday School Lesson Helps page.
Find more Sunday School lesson ideas on our Free Children Sunday School Lesson Helps page.
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