VERSES: 2 Kings 2:23-25
MEMORY VERSE: 2 Kings 2:24 "...go up, thou bald head, go up, thou bald head!"
BOOK TO REMEMBER: Hosea. Write "Hosea" on small slips of paper and hand out at the end of class. How are the students doing with their memorization? If they need help, it's always good to stop and review until they are more comfortable with the books. Sometimes the trouble is with the pronunciation of the names of the books. Make sure everyone knows how to pronounce Genesis through Hosea. Because this is a very short lesson, perhaps more time could be spent with memory work.
PRAYER: Pray that we will always treat others better than ourselves.
SPECIAL SONG: Be Patient And Kind (see April - Lesson - Joseph Meets His Brothers Who Hated Him on this blog). Children, Obey Your Parents (see March - Songs We Sing In Bible Class #4 on this blog).
VISUAL AID: A large Activity (see below).
LESSON POINTS:
- We remember that now one of the main prophets of God is Elisha. Remember how he picked up Elijah's mantle or cloak when Elijah was taken up into heaven by a chariot and horses of fire? God now spoke to Elisha instead.
- Elisha walked from Jericho to Bethel, and as he is going by the way, there came a group of young children out of the city. When they saw Elisha, they mocked him or made fun of him. Elisha was bald and the children taunted him and said, "Go up, you bald head! Go up, you bald head!" Was that a nice thing to do? NO! It is not a good thing to do now, but especially in Old Testament times. Back then, there were harsh or strict laws that said that children must obey their parents or they could be stoned and die. Children should always respect older people, especially their parents. Read Ephesians 5:19.
- When Elisha heard the children saying that he was bald in a very disrespectful way, he turned back, looked at them, and called down a curse on them in the name of the LORD (Deuteronomy 21:18-21). Then two female bears came out of the woods and tore up 42 of them. They should have watched their words and been kind, shouldn't they? There were consequences for being disrespectful.
- We need to be careful what we say and how we choose our friends. Our friends can persuade us to do things we normally would not do, but if our friends were good, obedient friends, perhaps they would help us to be good, too.
- If the two bears tore up 42 of the group, wonder how many children there were all together? (The Bible does not say).
ACTIVITY: Elisha And The Disrespectful Children
Materials needed: 9" x 12" white construction paper, two tiny scraps of brown fleece or soft material, 1" x 1" scrap of white paper, scrap of green paper, glue, marker, crayons.
- Hand out white construction paper.
- Fold 1/3 of paper to the back.
- Draw picture of Elisha coming down the road with 42 children on the side of the road giving Elisha a hard time.
- In the middle of the white construction paper at the top, write "Go up, thou bald head!"
- Draw a speech bubble around the words and pointing to the children.
- Write "Elisha" by Elisha.
- Write "2 Kings 2:23-25" at the top of the paper.
- Open folded paper.
- Continue the road to the end of the paper.
- Color the road.
- Draw simple tall trees. This is the woods.
- Out of material, cut two bears faces.
- Glue bear faces towards the bottom of the path.
- Put of white scraps of paper, cut four tiny circles.These are the bears' eyes.
- Glue eyes on bears.
- Draw black dots of the pupils of the bears' eyes.
- Cut bush out of green paper.
- Glue bush in front of bears.
- Write "2 Kings 2:24" on bush.
