Wells of Love
Memory Verse : 1 John 4:19
Bible Truth: God loved us first.
1. Open in prayer
2. Introduction
Love must begin somewhere and it began with God. God loves you because He chooses to love you. It is a decision He has made. None of us deserve God’s love, still He chooses to love us. Because of God’s love for us, we can love Him.
Love can be described as a feeling of great affection that causes us to give to and do things for another person
God showed His love for us in a wonderful way. He gave the most precious gift that He could give – His own Son, Jesus Christ. Jesus died to take away our punishment for sin forever. Believing and acting upon this truth about Jesus allows us to become part of God‘s family. When we believe on Jesus, He changes our hearts. God pours His love into our hearts and that love overflows to others. It is through the power of His love that we can love Him and others.
3. Praise and Worship Songs
1. _______________________________
2. _______________________________
4. Memory Verse
1 John 4:19 NKJV “We love Him because He first loved us.”
5. Love Of God
Jeremiah 31:3 NKJV “The Lord has appeared of old to me , saying:
‘Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love;
Therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you…’ ”
God’s love for us goes on and on. It has no end and it will never stop. His love is everlasting and it will continue throughout eternity. There is nothing that we can do or say that would make God love us more or less. He loves us with an unconditional love. God is like a loving parent who speaks with fatherly affection to his children, even when they are disobedient. God loves us just like we are but He loves us too much to leave us the way that we are. His desire is that everyone will be saved. However, the choice is ours and ours alone to make.
Since God’s love for us is everlasting, if we turn away from Him He longs for us to return. We must always remember that God loves the sinner, but He hates their sin. His desire for the person that has backslidden to repent and to return to Him.
Jeremiah 3:14 NKJV “Return, O backsliding children,’ says the Lord; ‘for I am married to you. I will take you, one from a city and two from a family, and I will bring you to Zion.’ ”
6. Game – Heart Relay Race
1 John 4:19 NKJV “We love Him because He first loved us.”
Need: Hearts with the memory verse written on them – one per child.
Divide the group into 2 even teams. Line the teams up in 2 lines. One at a time the girls are to run to the front and pick up a heart and say this week’s memory verse, then run back to their line. Then the next person will do the same and so on. The team that finishes first is the winner.
7. Love For God
Matthew 22:37 NKJV “Jesus said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.”
One day the Pharisees gathered around Jesus to ask Him some questions. They had hoped to catch Jesus in a lie or untruth in some way. They did not believe that Jesus was the Son of God and they wanted to prove it to all the people. One of the Pharisees, a lawyer, asked Jesus what was the greatest commandment. He was testing Jesus to see how much He really knew about the Law of Moses.
Jesus answered him by quoting the greatest Jewish confession of faith called the Shema. It means that we are to love the Lord with our whole being – our heart, our soul, and our mind.
Deuteronomy 6:4-5 NKJV “Hear, O Israel: ‘The Lord our God, the Lord is one! You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength.”
Require means to have need for, need, want, command, order, or demand. God requires for each one of us to love Him.
Deuteronomy 10:12 NKJV “And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways and to love Him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul.”
Loving God is not something that we have to “work at”. God Himself will work in our hearts so that we will love Him. He will cause us to be totally devoted to Him. The more we get to know God the more we love Him. Also, the more we know God, the more we will want to know Him.
Deuteronomy 30:6 NKJV “And the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the hearts of your descendants, to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.”
8. Game – Which Comes First? Memory Verse Race
Divide the memory verse up into 5 parts.
We love / Him because / He first / loved us. / 1 John 4:19
Make 2 sets of card with the memory verse dived up on them, each set a different color.
Need two teams of five children each.
Tape a card on each of the 10 children’s backs. At the signal they are to find their team (each team’s cards are a different color) and arrange themselves so that the verse can be correctly read (in order). The first team to do so correctly is the winner.
9. Love For Others
John 13:34 NKJV “A new commandment I give you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another.”
We are to choose to love others – not because of who they are or how they act. Rather, we are to choose to love them because of God’s love for us.
People naturally love themselves. Since we love ourselves we are concerned about our welfare and we want the best for ourselves. According to the commandment in Lev 19:18 we are to love others the same way that we love ourselves. We should also be concerned about their welfare and we should also want the best for them.
Matthew 22:39 NKJV “And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ ”
When we love others the way that God wants us to others will know that we are disciples of Christ. God’s love for us is unconditional and our love for others should also be unconditional.
John 13:34-35 NKJV “A new commandment I give you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”
Leviticus 19:18 NKJV “You shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudges against the children of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord.”
Our love for others will flow out of our love for God. They go hand in hand. If we don’t love others we really don’t love God. God has commanded us to love others.
1 John 4:20-21 NKJV “If someone says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also.’ ”
1 John 5:1-2 NKJV “Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and everyone who loves Him who begot also loves him who is begotten of Him. By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and keep His commandment.”
10. Game – Love Me Musical Chairs
God desire for us to love Him with our whole heart.
Need: music and chairs (1 less than the number of players)
We’re going to play a game of musical chairs. The last person left in the game will represent someone who took the time to love the Lord with their whole heart.
Have the children line up beside the chairs and march around them when the music starts to play. When the music stops each child is to find a chair to sit in. The person who is left without a chair is out.
Repeat process until only 1 person is left in the game.
11. Our Obedience Shows Our Love
John 14:15 NKJV “If you love Me, keep My commandments.”
Our obedience to God shows our love for God. If we truly love God we will obey Him and His commandments. When we love God we will personally know God. When a person does not obey God it shows a lack of personal knowledge of God therefore, it also shows a lack of love for and to God.
1 John 5:3 NKJV For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome.”
God’s love demands obedience. However, God’s commandments are not hard to bear, heavy, or oppressive. In reality God’s commandments bring freedom, liberty, and privileges to the believer. As we obey God’s commandments we reflect the image of God.
12. Game – Pass The Mirror
Our love for God will be reflected in our actions.
Need: Two no breakable mirror and music
1 John 4:19 NKJV “We love Him because He first loved us.”
Divide the group into two teams and line up in two rows. Give the first person on each team a mirror. At the signal they will pass it to the person behind them. When it reaches the end that person will run to the front of the line and say the memory verse, then pass the mirror to the person behind them. The game continues until the original first person is back at the front of the line.
13. Worship Song – ___________________________________
14. Challenge and Altar – Demonstrating God’s Love
No one deserves God’s love. He chooses to love us. Because of His great love for us, He gave the most precious gift anyone could ever give. He gave His own Son as a sacrifice for our sins, so that we could have a relationship with Him. God loved us even before we knew Him.
Romans 5:8 NKJV “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
By asking for forgiveness of our sins, through Jesus’ sacrifice, we can become a child of God. As part of God’s family we will want to be like our Father, and love others. Our love for others is not based on how we feel about them or think about them. Like God’s love toward us, it is a choice – we must choose to love others.
Have you entered into a love relationship with God by accepting Jesus as your Lord and Savior?
Are you allowing God’s love to show through you?
Are you demonstrating God’s love through your wards and actions?
Do you have trouble loving yourself or others?
15. Refreshments or a light meal
16. Craft
17. Dismissal