Faithful Families Resources November 6 2016

“Let your eyes light up  when your children are around. Laugh more. Tell them how empty and quiet it is when they’re not there. Enjoy  the things they bring to your life. Attend their activities, not as if they were compulsory for parents, but throw yourself into their lives”

~ Valeri Bell

Family Closeness

Game:

Write or print different phrases on small pieces of paper. Make enough for your whole family. Place them under each of your families plates. Make the phrases usable but strange. Eg: “I wish I was a mouse” or “Have you eaten centipede?” Before dinner get everyone to read the card under their plate to themselves, keeping it a secret from the rest of the family. Everyone has to use their phrase during dinner as naturally as they can in conversation. Potentiallt this could be a race in which whoever uses their phrase last loses. Or it can be a competition in which family members have to figure out when someone has used their assigned phrase.  

Sharing:

Questions for stimulating discussion in your family.

• What are the three most interesting things about you?
• Name five reasons you’re glad to be alive.
• If you could have any super power, what would it be and why?
• What’s your favorite song?  Why?

Story

With your family read:  Luke 21.5-19

(for a way of explaining/talking about this reading with children look at:
http://www.sermons4kids.com/when_afraid.htm

Questions for Discussion:

• This is a hard reading to hear. What do you think about it?
• What is Jesus preparing his disciples for?
• What is the reassurance Jesus gives at the end?

Prayer and Celebration

Thank you God for giving us food

One way of praying is through song. You may be familiar with the song that goes:

Thank you God for giving us food.

Thank you God for giving us food.

Thank you God for giving us food

Right where we are.

(If you type the first line in to youtube you can hear people singing it)

Sing around your table and let members of your family substitute the word food for anything they would like to say thank you for.

Family Activity

Butchers Paper Table Topic

Cover your dinner table top with butcher’s paper and bring out the crayons. Your family can draw and write and have discussion around the table while you are creating works of art.

(This material is based on and draws from earlier Faithful Families emails by Stephen Harrison and Richard Browning: An Unless Ideas Production.) Unless otherwise noted all material on this blog is copyright Stephen Harrison and Richard Browning