Spiritual Disciplines
Lesson 2: Service
Lesson Workbook - Click Here for NIV Click Here for KJV
Secret Service (Optional Activity) Click Here
LESSON OBJECTIVES
Goals
1. To demonstrate what it means to serve to students.
2. For students to understand that serving others is a spiritual discipline they need to practice.
3. To give students an opportunity to serve one another/the church.
Topics
Availability, Compassion, Discipline, Helping, Missions, Serving
OPENING PRAYER (5 to 10 minutes)
GETTING STARTED (10 minutes)
Set up your room quite differently this day. Make something seem special. If it’s winter, each student who enters will have their coat checked and taken to a seat. If you don’t usually have food, provide some. Even if you do, make it a point to serve the students their food. Bring in some adults. Maybe even dress them up like butlers and maids. The idea is to sort of surprise them with how well they are being served.
GROUP BUILDING (10 minutes)
• How does it make you feel when you are waited on hand and foot?
• Let’s brainstorm together; how many ways are you served each day? By how many different people? (parents, siblings, teachers, sponsors, friends, restaurant employees)
• How often do you take their service for granted?
• How much time do you spend serving those same people?
• Do you think when we serve others it makes them feel the same way we feel when we are served?
• What is the goal of service, then?
DIGGING IN (30 minutes)
Let’s look at some passages of scripture that talk about service:
Read Galatians 5:13
You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love.
Read Matthew 20:28
just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.
Read 1 Peter 4:10
Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God's grace in its various forms.
Discussion Questions
1. What do these passages have to say about service?
(we are called to serve, Jesus served us, there are a variety of ways we can serve, etc.)
2. What does the Matthew passage say is the main way Jesus served us? (giving his life)
3. How might that resemble the way we should serve? Should it be partial or temporary?
Three things about service you need to know• It’s how people know God’s grace (it’s an outward discipline) |
Optional Activity:
If you regularly take your students on a missions trip or service project, this would be a great time to preview it and let students know that you give them an opportunity to serve. If you don’t, you might consider finding somewhere locally that you as a group could go serve and use this lesson as a way of introducing that opportunity (a nursing home, hospital, etc.). See the optional activity “Secret Service” Click Here
MAKING IT REAL (10 minutes)
Discussion Questions
1) Why do you think it is hard to get into the habit of serving people?
2) How much do you really serve other people?
3) What are some ways you can serve people…even today?
I want to challenge each of you to find one way to serve someone else before the day ends. Maybe that means doing something at home, or just asking someone what you can do to help them. Don’t forget that it might be hard work—but we’re commanded to serve. Let’s go around and try to figure out one way in which we can serve someone before this day ends.
SCRIPTURE MEMORIZATION (5 to 10 minutes)
"Just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many"
Matthew 20:28 (NIV)