Summary
Elijah mentored Elisha as both were used by God to carry his words to the Israelites.
Questions
1. Who are the mentors in your life? Who are your role models, the people you look up to? Do you have spiritual mentors? If so, who? Are you a mentor to other youth?
2. Some of you received your faith through your parents. Do you feel somewhat like Elisha following in Elijah’s footsteps? What expectations are placed on you because of your parent’s faith? What feelings do you have as a result of these expectations?
3. What needs do you have as a youth living for God? What are your struggles in defending the faith as Elijah and Elisha did? How can the story of Elisha help you in dealing with needs, expectations, and struggles in living for God?
4. In what ways was Elisha confirmed and encouraged in his call to ministry by his mentor? How can you discover your own call to ministry? What confirmations do you seek in living for God? What would it take for God to convince you to stand up for God in your school?
5. What were the things that Elisha gained as he was mentored by Elijah? What lessons did he learn? What things were most important to his own call and ministry?
6. Elisha and Elijah had many visible signs that God was with them. Name some of them. What visible signs have you seen that God is with you?
7. What lessons can we learn from the story of Elijah and Elisha about mentoring? About standing up for God? About being God’s spokesman? About answering God’s call in our lives?
Materials
1. Choose a variety of items representing the obstacles Elisha faced. You might use an empty box of cereal, a tombstone, a glass of water, an empty coin purse, a crown (you can make one from yellow paper, etc.
2. Place two tables side by side with a gap between the two tables big enough for a person’s head.
3. Cover the tables with a sheet or cloth, including the gap. Line up the items along the top two side by side tables.
4. Arrange a youth in advance to hide beneath the table with his head sticking up between the two tables. Be sure to choose someone who is a good sport and won’t get upset with what will happen later.
5. Cover each item with a cardboard box, including the youth’s head between the two tables.
Activity
1. Choose three volunteers to compete to see who can identify all the items that Elisha faced in the quickest time possible.
2. Get someone to time each participant with a stop watch. One by one lift up the boxes and have the youth identify the item under it.
3. Save the person hiding for last. Then when you reveal the person hiding that person shouts “boo!” and tries to scare the person.
4. Repeat with the second volunteer.
5. The third volunteer does the same but have a pie tin with whip creme or shaving creme to push into the person’s face who is hiding after they scare the third volunteer. Be careful of eyes. hah hah… last laugh is on you!
Scripture
2 Kings 1:1-4:44
Application
Elisha faced many obstacles in his role as a prophet. But God always took care to provide for his needs and get him through the difficulties. One of the greatest obstacles we have to serving God and standing up when there difficulties is fear. But God can always conquer our fear in the end if we will simply trust him. Sometimes we might receive a little persecution or even a pie in the face, but when we must stand up for God because that is what we have been called to do.
MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”
200 page e-book that explains everything you need to know when planning your very own object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed object lesson ideas and another 200 object lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms and Names / Descriptions of God.
Materials
Cardboard or newsprint, or paper large enough to block the door of the room.
What to do
Using cardboard boxes block off the entrances to the classroom. You can even tape paper over the door if nothing else. You might paint it or draw bricks on it so it looks like a wall.
Have youth bust through the paper to enter the classroom.
Discuss the obstacles we have to living our faith in a world that does not know God. How can we bust through these obstacles like we did the wall blocking the classroom door?
Give each youth a peice of paper or cardboard used to block the door. Have them write obstacles on one side and ways we can break through the obstacles with God’s provision on the other side.
Variation
As an alternative object lesson bring in a small brick or piece of wood painted to look like a brick for each student. Have the youth write a symbol of at least one obstacle they face in their spiritual lives onto this brick and keep it in a prominent place at home to remind them that there is no obstacle God cannot overcome in your walk with Him.
Scripture
2 Kings 1:1-4:44
Summary
God wants to help us move beyond the obstacles in life.
MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”
200 page e-book that explains everything you need to know when planning your very own object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed object lesson ideas and another 200 object lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms and Names / Descriptions of God. Learn More…
Activity
1. Set up chairs and tables and other things as obstacles for when youth / children enter the room. You can also design an obstacle course for them.
2. Ask two volunteers to go through the course blindfolded.
3. While they are outside the room being blindfolded, remove all of the obstacles. Choose a guide for each blindfolded volunteer to carefully guided through the non-existent obstacles. Make sure to include instructions about avoiding the obstacles, even though they have been removed.
4. Surprise the youth / Children when you remove the blindfolds.
Application
Sometimes God gives us the strength and a guide such as he did Elisha, but at other times God removes the obstacles as when he parted the Jordan River for Elisha and Elijah.
Scripture
2 Kings 1:1-4:44
MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”
200 page e-book that explains everything you need to know when planning your very own object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed object lesson ideas and another 200 object lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms and Names / Descriptions of God.
Materials
Prepare a list of actions of Elijah and Elisha.
Possibilities for statements
* Fed by ravens
* Increased a widow’s supplies
* rebuked kings
* Challenged the prophets of Baal
* Didn’t die.
* Wore a mantle as a symbol of his office as a prophet
* Raised a woman’s dead son
* Parted the Jordan River
* Slain captains and men by calling down fire
* Removed poison from a stew
* Fed 100 men with 20 barley loaves
etc.
Activities
1. Have youth correctly identify which actions belong to Elijah . Elisha. As a competition you might divide the class into two teams and the first team to correctly match the prophets with the actions wins. Some actions will apply to both Elijah and Elisha.
2. Call out the statements and have youth perform an action associated with each prophet. For Elijah have them spin around in place representing the whirlwind in which he was taken to heaven. For Elisha, have them rub the top of their head with the palm of their hand, representing his baldness. (Elisha was mocked by youth for his baldness and those mocking him were slain by bears.) In instances where the statement applies to both, they must do both simultaneously.
Scripture
2 Kings 1:1-4:44
Summary
Elijah mentored Elisha. God used both Elisha and Elijah to teach the Israelites.
MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”
200 page e-book that explains everything you need to know when planning your very own object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed object lesson ideas and another 200 object lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms and Names / Descriptions of God.
Activity
Ask Youth or Children,
“If you could ask God one question, what would you ask?”
Questions are positives, not negatives.
If a child / teen is not asking spiritual questions he / she is not growing spiritually. In “Experiencing God” by Henry Blackaby this is referred to as a “crisis of belief.”
Honest doubts and questions are not the same as unbelief. Actually, they are the sign of belief or of a developing belief. Faith is not the absence of doubt, but moving forward despite the doubts. As decisions are made, in spite of the doubts, one’s faith grows and the doubts disappear.
As you help children / youth /adults to work through their doubts and questions you will be nurturing their faith.
MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”
200 page e-book that explains everything you need to know when planning your very own object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed object lesson ideas and another 200 object lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms and Names / Descriptions of God.
Description
A communicative exercize in which individuals or groups must present a specific view of an issue and argue against other views presented by other groups.
Example
Jesus violated the Sabbath to heal the sick.
Group 1: Take the position of the Pharisees in keeping the Sabbath
Group 2: Take the position of Jesus in healing the sick
Key Actions
1. Choose the topic or issue and participants
2. Provide information, references or other sources that can be used in arguments
3. Give all sides of the issue opportunity to present their views and to respond to other views.
MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”
200 page e-book that explains everything you need to know when planning your very own object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed object lesson ideas and another 200 object lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms and Names / Descriptions of God.
Preparation
Make a list of professions. Some possibilities might include:
a lawyer
a dentist
an astronaut
a baker
a policeman
a mechanic
an engineer
a pilot
a doctor
a fireman
an architect
a counselor
Activity
You can play charades with your list, pin the names on the back and ask kids to discover their occupation, or make a list of equipment and tools that each occupation uses and have children match the tools with the occupation.
Application
Discuss how we trust each of these people to do their jobs. While we cannot be experts in all areas, we trust those who ARE the experts. We may not understand why the doctor chooses a specific medicine or a mechanic uses a specific tool, but we trust their expertise. In the same way we do not know everything about God or understand everything God understands, but he is our Creator and as such we can trust him with our life. (Ecclesiastes 3:16-22)
Use this creative teaching activity as a reminder to youth or children that we cannot know everything so we place our trust in various experts. We need to place the sme kind of trust in our Creator.
MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”
200 page e-book that explains everything you need to know when planning your very own object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed object lesson ideas and another 200 object lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms and Names / Descriptions of God.
Activity
Divide the group into two or more teams. As a series of characteristics are called out, you must carry the team member with those characteristics to the front. First team to do so gets a point. If the person being carried touches the ground he / she must return to the start. In the event that more that one person has the same characteristic the team must choose one that has not been carried yet. If all with the same characteristic have already been carried then the team may choose one.
Possible Characteristics:
(use care to not embarass anyone unduly)
1. Person on the team with the largest shoe.
2. Shortest person on your team.
3. Person on your team with the longest hair
4. Person with the birthday closest to today
5. Person on your team with the darkest skin
6. Tallest person on your team
7. Person on your team with the longest fingernails
8. Person on your team with the most siblings
9. Person with the greatest number of letters in his / her name
10.Person on your team that travels the farthest distance to come to church
11.Person on your team who hasn’t been carried yet
12.Person on your team with the longest pinky finger
13.Person on your team with the most worn socks
14.Person on your team with the most pointed nose
15.Person on your team with the greatest number of pets
16.Person on your team with the ugliest big toe
17.Add your own here……………………
Application
We need to carry others to God in prayer, and lift them up with our words and actions. That is what brings us all together in unity.
MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”
200 page e-book that explains everything you need to know when planning your very own object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed object lesson ideas and another 200 object lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms and Names / Descriptions of God.
Description
A description of the meaning of a word or phrase.
example
Faith: a strong belief in a supernatural power or powers that control human destiny
Faith: a convinced belief
Faith: Belief without evidence
Key Actions
1. Have members form a personal definition
2. Read formal definitions from dictionaries, encyclopedias or other sources.
Game Idea
1. Award the person whose definition is closest to that in the dictionary
2. Include webster dictionary among the entries. Ask youth to try to find the corerct definition among those given
Application
A dictionary is the one of the best Bible study tools available. It opens up the meaning of the words as used in scriptures and is accessible to anyone. Teaching kids and youth to use a dictionary while they study the Bible has great benefit!
MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”
200 page e-book that explains everything you need to know when planning your very own object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed object lesson ideas and another 200 object lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms and Names / Descriptions of God.
Creative Youth ideas: 1700+ Resources for youth leaders, pastors, ministers to help plan camps, retreats, and meetings using games, illustrations, Children's Worship, Bible Studies, object lessons, sermons, creative ideas,creative activities
