Read Galations 5:22-23 at least once during the week. Read it daily if you’d like! We’re wanting the kids to memorize The Fruit of The Spirit.
Romans 8:25 is the memory verse this week. Read the memory verse at the beginning of each devotional time. The goal is to have each member of your family memorize this verse to the best of their ability this week. I also use the weekly memory verse in our handwriting lessons. You can print out the image above or make your own- just try to get the written verse up on your wall this week. (Image is sized to print 5×7.)
Day One: We Wait
“Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet.” – Aristotle
Waiting is hard work. Not very many people wait well. It seems we are all born wanting what we want right now. No waiting. Waiting is hard work. But when we wait, we get more in the end. If you are making a cake, and you don’t wait long enough, you just end up with a hot mess. But if you wait, you get a wonderful cake! Patience isn’t simply waiting. It is waiting without getting angry or upset. It isn’t really patience to wait while tapping your foot. Take a deep breath, and wait with patience, in peace.
Activity: Let’s play a game! Red light, green light is a great game to practice patience.
Day Two: The Farmer
In James 5:7, the Bible tells us to be patient like a farmer. Have you ever planted seeds? Did they sprout immediately? You had to wait to see the seed sprout. And then, you had to wait even longer to see the flower. And then, if it was a vegetable, you had to wait even longer to see the vegetables. You don’t get angry at the plant for not growing fast enough. You don’t try to rush it along saying, “Hurry, plant! Hurry!!!” You just wait. And when the plant produces the vegetable, you pick it and you’re thankful that it grew. If we tried to apply the same calm waiting, or patience, in our lives a little more, we’d see more fruit and be a little more thankful.
Activity: Coloring page.
Optional Activity: Grab some small pots and plant some seeds. Clover and beans tend to grow fairly quickly and pretty well. Plant them with the kids, say a prayer asking God to help them grow, and then wait. You’ll need to water them, of course, but mostly you just wait. You could make a show of yelling at the plant and trying to make it grow right now this instance to show that you really do just have to wait.
Day Three: What I Had In Mind
“Let nothing perturb you, nothing frighten you. All things pass. God does not change. Patience achieves everything.” – Teresa of Avila
Sometimes patience means letting things work out how they are going to work out. It is hard for us not to get our way sometimes. We wanted to go to the zoo, but it rained. We wanted to go to the park, but it was too cold. And sometimes we want things to work out a certain way. We want things in a particular order. We pray and ask God for things. What happens if He answers us in a way we did not expect? Well, usually, we either get upset or we don’t even recognize He answered. Let us pray, and wait with patience for God to answer us. Let us keep our mind open to His working, it may not be what we expected, but God is working and He does answer us.
Activity: Play charades. Everyone put a word into a hat. Think about how YOU would act out the word you put in. Take turns drawing a word out of the hat. If you get your own, put it back and draw again. After the word has been guessed, ask who put the word in and ask if that was EXACTLY what they had in mind.
Day Four: Praise Him In The Hallway
Have you ever heard the phrase, “When one door closes, another one opens.”? What do you think that means? Sometimes in life, we sit in front of a door, praying God will open that door. It might be that the door is the door to a new job, a new school, a new friend. Sometimes the door is the door to healing, getting something we think we need, or help in a hard time. Those doors don’t always open right away. And sometimes we sit in front of the door we think will open, and miss the wide open door down the hall. If we don’t have patience, we don’t sit in front of the door at all. We pray that God will open the door, then we walk off to something else. How would you ever know if the door opened if you walked off? But while we’re waiting for God to open doors, we can praise Him in the hallway. While we’re waiting for Him to answer prayers, we can thank Him for what He is doing in our life today.
Activity: What big things are we praying for? They can be family prayers (a new home, a new baby, a new job) or individual prayers (a new friend, healing, individual opportunities). What are you thankful for right now?
Grab a piece of paper and some construction paper. Cut out a door with the construction paper. (Just a rectangle you can glue one strip down so it opens and closes like a door.) Draw one of those big things on the paper, glue the door on top, and then draw something you’re thankful for right now outside the door. Thank God for the thing outside the door and pray for the door to open, too.
Day Five: No Hurry
“Without peace, we will learn less in life. We will see less. We will feel less. We will hear less. Ironically, rush and more usually mean less.” – Mother Teresa
If we hurry through life, we’ll miss most of it. Let’s take a walk, watch a movie as a family, read a book together, something to slow down and not hurry through life. Take the time to listen and see the world around us. Take the time to listen and enjoy each other. Memories are made today.
Activity: Go on a walk, watch a movie, read a book- slow down and spend some time as a family. Try to take in as much as your senses can handle.
Activity 2: Did you learn your memory verse? Share it!
