Like a photo album, the Bible is brimming with self-portraits of a God who wants to be known.

Wild Truth Bible Lessons—Pictures of God is your guide to 12 God pictures taken straight from the photo album of the Scriptures.

Your middle schoolers will never again picture God as a bearded, doddering old codger after they see for themselves from the Bible how God pictures himself as a rescue worker, water, rock, potter, gift, servant, inventor, mom, listener, comedian, child, and judge.

Introduce your junior highers to God's character with these 12 Bible studies...lead them in exploring who God is and why he's worth knowing better...discover how he wants us to copy his picture into our character.

With, of course, original scripts and skits, discussion starters and creative questions, video ideas, games galore, case studies, tips for teaching early adolescents, handouts, options. And Bible passages that bring kids face to face with the God of the Bible—the God who can grow your students up into vibrant spiritual maturity.

Lesson 2

God is like Water

O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water. —Psalm 63:1

GOALS

Students will—

• Understand why God is like water
• Understand how they can be like water by refreshing, quenching, and reviving other people
• Choose a water plan

 

PICTURE PREP

You'll Need... • an ice chest full of water with six lemons in it • a large pan full of water and ice with grapes in it • four baby bottles full of water • a Super Soaker filled with water (lots of kids have one of these—you could borrow it instead of buying it) • a trash bag

Water Games

Start your time with a little water carnival. Most of these games won’t require kids to get totally drenched, so they’d still be appropriate for Sunday school, as well as another youth group time. But make sure you’re careful about kids’ clothing. And make sure you have a bunch of towels on hand! You could make this whole series of games a competition between the guys and the girls or between grades.

Lemon Bobbing
Instead of bobbing for apples, try lemons. Fill an ice chest with water and have contestants (with their hands behind their backs) try to grab the lemons with their teeth. Give a hundred points for every lemon snatched within 15 seconds. Play three rounds so each team has an opportunity to get three lemons.

Toe Grape-Grabbing
Fill a large pan or bowl with water (the colder the better) and lots of ice. Crushed ice is best but anything will work. Put grapes underneath and in the ice. Have contestants use their toes to try to grab grapes. Play a few rounds and give them 50 points for each grape they grab within 15 seconds (they can grab more than one per round). If you’re a little sick and twisted (you work with junior highers—isn't this obvious?), consider giving bonus points for kids who will eat the grapes.

Water Bottle
Get four baby bottles (they’re really cheap if you buy the—well, the cheap ones!) and fill them with water. Take a pin or a knife and make the hole in the end of the nipple a bit larger (this game will take forever otherwise!). Have two contestants from each team race to guzzle the water. Give 200 points for first place, 100 points for second place, and 50 points for third.

Super Soaker Drink
Fill a Super Soaker with water. In case you’ve been living in a space station for the last decade, a Super Soaker is a high-powered squirt gun that shoots water a long way. Rip a head-hole in the end of a trash bag and have each contestant (one at a time, one from each team) place it over her head to keep her somewhat dry. Then stand at a distance and squirt right at her mouth. Have a neutral judge decide which contestant was better at drinking from the Super Soaker. By the way, it’s inevitable that you’ll spray a little water on this one. The floor will get a bit wet. The Ralph W. Peterson Memorial Wallpaper might get a drop of water on it. So be warned!

 

Golden Rules Keeping the atmosphere of your junior high meetings somewhere between a morgue and a piranha feeding frenzy is the constant challenge of young teen ministry. Discipline as a case-by-case punishment for the purpose of maintaining a modicum of control is reactive and negative. Moving from reactive to proactive, however, casts discipline as positive. I've developed a handful of rules essential to conducting a successful junior high meeting. Don't mess with other people or their stuff. Don't talk when others are talking. No making fun of others for calling them names. Handouts are not to become airplanes, confetti, or doodle pads. Launching airborne objects, paper or otherwise, will result in death. (Feel free to soften the penalty here; but the rule's good). Then communicate these rules like crazy, along with the consequences for noncompliance. Choose realistic and enforceable consequences. From Help! I'm a Junior High Youth Worker! by Mark Oestreicher (Youth Specialties).

 

You'll Need... • water balloons • hoses • buckets • a water source

OPTIONAL GAME

Water Fight!
If your group isn’t meeting on Sunday morning in pretty clothes, and if the weather’s warm enough, consider having an all-out water war. Don’t tell the kids what you have planned. Tell them it’s a water balloon tossing game. Get them all outside, and pull out a trash can full of pre-made water balloons. (Here’s a tip: put water in the trash can so the balloons don’t rub against each other and break.) Have kids pair up and stand facing each other. Each time they toss the balloon, have them move one step farther apart.

Okay, that’s the boring part. But you, and your volunteers, know the real plan! Have a bunch of small buckets of water and a hose with a spray nozzle ready. Once the kids are concentrating on their little tossing activity—nail ’em! Just go crazy and start a massive water war free-for-all. Your kids will be caught off guard that you would do something so uncontrolled—something you’d usually scold them for. You’ll create a fun group memory and a bunch of soggy kids!

 

You'll Need... • one copy of the melodrama script for you to read • three cups with just a little bit of water in each one • Bibles

ACTION SHOT

Multiple-Choice Melodrama

Ask for two volunteers, a guy and a girl, to play parts in a little melodrama. Explain that they don’t have to read any parts—they just have to act out the action as you read it. And if there are any spoken parts, you’ll say them, and they just have to repeat them.

Then tell the whole group they’re going to see the same story three times. Each time it will be a little bit different. Their job is to decide which of the stories is the closest to the actual Bible story.

Melodrama Script Handout

Now read the three stories and have the actors ham it up. Each time there’s a spoken part, read the line, then pause for the actor to repeat it.

After you read and act out all three versions, have the kids vote for the one they think is closest to the real thing. The correct answer is the third one—and this will be obvious to all but those kids who weren't paying attention. The only kids who’ll vote for another answer are those seventh grade boys who think, Ooh, it’ll be really, really funny if I vote for the wrong answer! Ha! I’m so funny! But it doesn’t matter if they all get it right—that will just make them feel good.

Have everyone turn in their Bibles to John 4 and follow along while you read the real story from verses 4-14. Realize this is a tough mental leap for most of your kids—to perceive how Jesus is "living water that quenches our souls." So you might have to unpack the idea for them a bit by talking, just like Jesus did, about thirst. But first, ask if anyone can explain how God is like water, according to this passage. If they can’t come up with a reasonable explanation (which is likely), read this list of things water does, and ask kids to stand up for those things that God also does. Each time kids are standing, ask one of them to explain what they mean.

• rehydrates (makes dry things moist)
• quenches thirst
• flushes bad stuff out of our bodies
• dissolves things
• cleans
• knows how to spell chrysanthemum
• cools
• refreshes

Now probably half of your kids (the older ones) are starting to understand this abstract concept, but you’ll probably need to go one step further for the other kids.

Explain by saying, It’s like this. Our souls, the deepest spiritual part of who we are, gets thirsty. Not for real water, but for something that will make us come alive. People try to quench this thirst with wild living and partying, with money, with adrenaline rushes; but none of those things will take away the thirst in your soul—Jesus will. That’s why he’s called living water: because he’s alive and he satisfies all our needs.

 

SELF-PORTRAIT

Water Rating

You'll Need... • copies of Water Kidz • pens or pencils

Move students into groups of about three each. Pass out (that means distribute, not fall to the floor!) copies of Water Kidz and writing utensils to your students. If they’re anywhere within 10 degrees of normal for young teens, these writing utensils will soon become weapons of destruction. Ah, well.

Water Kidz Handout

Ask the groups to read through these short descriptions of teens who were like water and rank them in order. Tell them they have to work as a team to decide which teen is most water-like (that would be number eight) all the way down to the one who’s least water-like (that would be number one). Now give the groups about five minutes to work. Don’t forget to circulate around the room to make sure they understand what they’re supposed to be doing. By the way, if they give the story about Rick dumping water on his brother’s head a high rating, that will be a good clue they still don’t understand this water picture!

After several minutes, or after all your kids seem to be talking about movies and music instead of this assignment, pull them back together and debrief. Ask them who they rated high, who they rated low, and why for both.

Then ask your students to look over the stories again. Ask them to rate the stories on their own sheets, again from eight to one, to reflect which of these situations would be most difficult for them to do (eight is easiest to do; one is most difficult to do).

Then, after a few more minutes, debrief this as well, asking the students what they put at the top and bottom and why.

 

PRINT IT

You'll Need... • the sheets they already have in their greasy little hands

Takin’ It Home

Finally, have them look at their wildpage one more time. This time ask them to choose one of those ideas to try this week. Tell them that if they’re willing to try one of them, they should cross out the character’s name and write their own above it, then circle that whole idea. Also tell them that they can make up a new plan and write it on the back of the sheet if they want. Again, have a few students share their answers.

Then close in prayer, asking God for courage to follow through on these water-like behaviors and thanking him for being living water in our lives.

 

HANDY REVIEW OPTION

Weekly Wall Art

If you're using the signs idea described in Lesson 1, add a graphic of some water. Just color a large piece of paper or posterboard blue, then scallop one edge to look like waves.

Acknowledgments
Foreword

God is like a—

Gift
It is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God.
You can be a gift to other people by giving yourself.

Water
My soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water.
You can quench, revive, and refresh people with God's love.

Rescue Worker
He has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves.
You can help people in trouble when you stop focusing on yourself.

Rock
Lead me to the rock that is higher than I.
You can grow in integrity and be known as a person who is trustworthy.

Potter
We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand.
God can use you to mold and influence other people.

Servant
Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom I delight.
You're most like God when you serve other people.

Inventor
You made the heavens, even the highest heavens, and all their starry host, the earth and all that is on it, the seas and all that is in them.
God has made you creative and inventive—and he wants you to use these abilities.

Mom
As a mother comforts her child, so will I comfort you.
You can comfort your friends when they go through tough times.

Listener
Before they call I will answer; while they are still speaking I will hear.
Just by listening—really listening—you can show people you care.

Comedian
Our mouths were filled with laughter, our tongues with songs of joy.
You can use your sense of humor in good ways or bad ways.

Child
Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
Grow up—but hold on to some of the good things about being a kid.

Judge
And the heavens proclaim his righteousness, for God himself is judge.
You are capable of great decisions!