Green Pastures and Still Waters

Memory Passage

“The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.  He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the LORD forever.” Psalm 23

Day 1-A Wife for Isaac

  • Pray.
  • Read all of Psalm 23, or watch Teaching Kids how to memorize Psalm 23 – YouTube if you are practicing your sign language with it.
  • This week we are going to work on memorizing Psalm 23:2. Look it up in your Bible or have your kids practice finding it. For younger kids, remind them that Psalms is in the middle of the Bible. First they need to find the chapter-the big number 23. Then they can find the tiny verse number 2 under that chapter.
  • Read Psalm 23:2 and have them repeat you a few times.
    • When you read that verse, what feeling words come to your mind?
  • Last week we read about Abraham and how the Lord guided him. We read that God gave Abraham a son when he was old. What was his son’s name? Sarah, Isaac’s mom, had recently died, and Abraham was getting pretty old. Isaac was at the age to get married, and Abraham wanted to make sure Isaac married someone who would not lead him away from God.
  • Read Genesis 24:1-14. Pause and retell in your own words to clarify what was happening.
  • Read Genesis 24:15-33. After you read these verses, you can continue reading verses 34-49, or you can explain that the servant told Rebekah’s family all that had happened to him from the time Abraham gave him the job of finding a wife for Isaac.
  • Read Genesis 24:52-58, 61-67.
  • Talk about it.
    • How did we see God working today?
    • Who recognized that the Lord was guiding him? (see verses 27 and 48)
    • What stands out to you from what we read today?
  • Activity Idea
    • Have a picnic in “green pastures”.
    • Take a nature walk and look for “still waters”.

Day 2-Jacob’s Shepherd

  • Pray.
  • Practice Psalm 23:1-2.
  • Yesterday we read about Isaac and Rebekah. They had twin boys; do you know their names? Even while they were in Rebekah’s womb they struggled with one another. The Lord told Rebekah before they were born that the older son would serve the younger one (back then, the older son was usually the next leader of the family). Esau was the older son; he was a hunter who enjoyed being outdoors. Jacob was the younger son, and the Bible calls him a peaceful man who liked being home. One day after Esau was out hunting, he came home and was starving! Jacob had cooked a pretty good looking stew, and Esau asked if he could have some. Jacob said he could IF Esau agreed to giving Jacob his birthright (a double portion of the inheritance and right to be the head of the family). Esau, without thinking it through, agreed because he “was about to die” from hunger. (Genesis 25:19-34) We’ll see later how this wasn’t the last time Jacob and Esau struggled with one another.
  • At the end of his life, Jacob calls God “my shepherd all my life” (Genesis 48:15). We are going to take the next several days learning about Jacob’s life to see how God was His shepherd.
  • Read Genesis 27:1-45. Pause after verses 29 and 40 to retell in your own words or have your kids retell the story back to you to check for understanding.
  • Talk about it.
    • What did we learn about Jacob today?
    • How would you describe him?
    • What did we learn about God from what we read today? Think about what He told Rebekah when the babies were still in her tummy (Genesis 25:23).
    • What God says will always come true. God had a plan to use Jacob to carry out his plan of making Abraham’s family into a great nation and eventually bringing the Savior (Jesus) to the world through their family.

Day 3-Jacob Had a Dream

  • Pray.
  • Practice Psalm 23:1-2.
  • Review what we read yesterday.
    • Tell me what you know about Jacob.
    • How was Esau feeling about all that happened?
    • Since Esau was so angry with Jacob, Rebekah thought it would be best for Jacob to go stay with her brother, Laban, for a few days until Esau calmed down a bit. She told Isaac that this was a good time for Jacob to go and find a wife from their homeland so that he wouldn’t marry a Canaanite wife who would worship other gods. (Genesis 27:41-46)
  • Read or tell in your own words Genesis 28:1-5.
  • Read Genesis 28:10-22.
    • What did Jacob see in his dream?
    • What did God tell Jacob in his dream?
    • Can you find the verse where God sounds like a shepherd? Read verse 15 again.
    • What does God promise Jacob?
    • What did Jacob realize? (verses 16-17)
    • What did he do the next morning?
    • What did you learn from the chapter of the Bible we read today?

Day 4-Jacob Meets Rachel

  • Pray.
  • Practice Psalm 23:1-2.
  • When we left off yesterday, Jacob was on a journey heading to his uncle Laban’s house. Remember that he had tricked Isaac and had received the blessing Esau was supposed to have gotten. Esau was very angry and wanted to kill Jacob so his parents sent Jacob away to find a wife from their homeland. We read yesterday that God had promised to be with Jacob wherever he went, and He gave the same promise to Jacob that He had given to Abraham and Isaac-that His family would possess the Promised Land and through them all the families of the earth would be blessed. (Genesis 28:13-15)
  • Read Genesis 29:1-19.
  • Read or tell in your own words Genesis 29:20-30. Parents, there is some mature language in this passage, so if you feel your kids aren’t ready for that you may want to tell this part in your own words.
  • Read Genesis 29:31-35.
  • Talk about it.
    • Put the story in order. Here are some different options on how to go about doing this:
      • Explain that you will give each child a word to start a sentence. They will complete the sentence with what happened in the story. The goal is to stay in order and retell the story that they just read. Here are a few transition words you can give your kids to help them stay in order.
        • First
        • Next
        • Then
        • After
        • Once
        • This time
        • Again
        • Finally
      • Have your kids make a comic strip of what happened in the story.
      • For younger kids, draw simple pictures or print our some pictures of things that happened in the story. You say what happened in the story as your child finds the pictures and puts them in order as you retell the story. Here are some ideas for the pictures you may want to have:
        • a man walking (Jacob)
        • shepherds and sheep
        • a young woman (Rachel) with some sheep
        • a house
        • two girls (Leah and Rachel)
        • a man working in a field
        • the number 7
        • a bride and groom
        • a man with a mad face (Jacob)
        • a bride and groom
        • a man working in a field
        • the number 7
        • a woman with four sons
    • How do we see the Lord working in this story? Hint: look at the verbs in verses 31-33.
    • God sees each one of us, and He hears us when we pray to Him.
  • Pray. Thank God that He sees each of your children (name them) and that He hears us when we pray.

Day 5-Time to Go Back Home

  • Pray.
  • Practice Psalm 23:1-2.
    • Have your kids write out or trace Psalm 23:2.
    • If you started a Psalm 23 book last week, make a new page for the second verse. Write or trace the verse and illustrate it.
    • If you have young kids, pick out a few of the main words and have them trace those and color a coloring page that goes with the verse.
  • We read yesterday that Leah, the surprise wife that Laban gave to Jacob, had four sons. But Rachel, the wife that Jacob loved and intended to marry in the first place had no children. She became jealous of her sister, Leah, and they both ended up giving their maids to Jacob to marry so they could have more sons to call their own. (Genesis 30:1-21) It seems like an intense and bitter competition, doesn’t it?
  • Rachel still had no children of her own, but God remembered her, and at last He gave her a son. Do you know his name? It was Joseph. (Genesis 30:22-24)
  • Read Genesis 30:25-36. Retell it in your own words if you need to.
    • Jacob agreed to continue to take care of Laban’s animals as long as he got to take some of the flock as payment. He left Laban the ‘best’ of the animals, but Jacob’s flock grew large, and he became very prosperous.
  • Read Genesis 31:1-3.
    • What did God instruct Jacob to do?
    • What did God promise him?
  • Read Genesis 31:4-7.
    • What are some things Jacob says about God that show that He recognized Him as his Shepherd? (verses 5, 7)
    • Jacob acknowledged that God had been with him the whole time he was with Laban. He told his wives that God had protected him from being hurt by Laban. He told his wives that it was time to go back home to where his family lived. They agreed and they secretly left home and left Laban, their father.
  • Read Genesis 31:22-24.
    • How did God again protect Jacob?
  • Because of God’s intervening and protecting Jacob, Laban peacefully left his daughters and his grandchildren so they could travel with Jacob back to his homeland.
  • Even though he had one crisis behind him, Jacob was getting ready to face what he thought could be another…returning home and having to face Esau again. We’ll read about that next week!