It was good to have everyone back together on Sunday morning after two weekends in a row of winter retreats!  We started off together for worship and announcements, and then split up the junior and senior high for the teaching time.

The middle school kids continued the series from Mark Oestreicher’s ‘Wild Truth Bible Lessons‘.  Chris Z taught the lesson entitled ‘Flaky Jakes, the thankless bunch,’ which was based on the passage in Luke 17:11-19 where Jesus healed the ten lepers, but only one came back to thank him.  The goal for the lesson was that students would learn the importance of expressing gratitude – certainly the healed men felt grateful, but they didn’t express it!  A practical way to live that out was suggested – kids were challenged to write a letter of thanks to someone and mail it or hand deliver it this week at some point!

I taught the sixth of six lessons in our series working through Galatians.  I’m using The Complete New Testament Resource, Volume 1 from Youth Specialties as a launching pad for the series, which has been really helpful.  This week we read chapter six of Galatians, with a focus on Galatians 6:1-5.  The topic was that we need each other, with a goal of students knowing the importance of helping one another through difficult times. We also wanted them to learn to be responsible for their own actions.  In this passage Paul taught that believers should carry each other’s burdens and help each other with personal struggles. He also encouraged believers to be their best and to be proud of who they are—they should not compare themselves with others.  A follow up activity would be to reread the passage and then use the following discussion questions:

• What is the best approach to helping a fellow believer caught in sin?
• How can you share the burden of someone else?
• What responsibility do Christians have toward each other?
• What does it mean to carry your own load if you’re also instructed to carry each other’s burdens?