- He speaks through the words of Jesus in his teaching, recorded for us in the Bible.
- He speaks through the example of Jesus in the way that he lived, loving and helping people, putting their interests before his own and obeying God all of the time.
- He speaks to us through the Spirit of Jesus who lives in every Christian.
- Knowing God as our loving, heavenly father. Knowing Jesus as our brother.
- Being part of the world wide church family with all our brothers and sisters in Jesus.
- Knowing love, joy, hope, peace and forgiveness in our lives.
- Looking forward to the inheritance that is ours in Jesus, which is being with God and all the other saints in paradise forever.
John 1:1-14 - All Age Talk 2009
John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of men. 5 The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it. 6 There came a man who was sent from God; his name was John. 7 He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all men might believe. 8 He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light. 9 The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world. 10 He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. 11 He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. 12 Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God - 13 children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God. 14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
Get some lego building blocks. Make them into shapes associated with Jesus. I made a cross, heart, light shining in dark ( a ray of white with black background ), Jesus' face. A crib might be another possibility.
Show the children lego pieces ( withhold what you have made ).
Ask them what it is. If they don't know some of them will have come across duplo when they were younger, others lego computer games where the characters are made of lego.
Tell them lego is a Greek word which means to lay down and then to pick up and put together. A brilliant word for lego, which you lay down, pick up and then put together.
Show them the lego pieces you have made. These all tell us something about Jesus and God's love for us.
After a while the word lego changed to logos to mean word. The idea was that you gathered words together to speak and communicate with people. Logos is saying what is in our minds.
John's gospel begins "en archei ho logos", in the beginning was the word.
This Christmas some people will play charades, when you have to communicate something, for example the title of a film, without using words.
God speaks to us through "the word", the logos, Jesus.
If we hear, know and trust in his words we become children of God.