The Christmas Story Tree

Scripture References: John 3:16

Teaching Concept: The Christmas story is more than just a story about Jesus' birth. It is a story about how God loves us and planned for us to be saved and live with him forever.

Opening Activities

1. Make Christmas Butterflies - Go to Danielle's Place for directions on how to make these butterflies. If you don't want to buy the nylon butterflies, you can just cut butterfly shapes from card stock.

2. Make Christmas Cross Ornaments -

What you will need: shiny paper, construction paper or fun foam, star stickers, and other decorative items. You can buy sparkly prism paper from Oriental Trading Company - Type in 57/6140 in the search box at the top of the page.

What to do:

1. Print out the pattern (Large file or small file) and use it to cut cross shapes from paper. You can use the star pattern to cut out star shapes or just buy star stickers.

2. Let your children decorate the crosses with stickers, glitter glue, sequins, etc.

The Christmas Craft Page has links to other cross ornaments you can make.

The Lesson

Preparation: Gather one of each ornament that your children made from the previous lessons.

(Hold up the Isaiah scroll ornament.)

We have been talking about Jesus' birth for the last four weeks. We talked about how the prophets of old wrote about how and where Jesus would be born.

(Hold up the craft stick manger scene ornament.)

And we learned that it all came true exactly how they said it would happen: He was born in Bethlehem, he was a descendent of Kind David, and he was named Immanuel.

(Hold up the angel ornament.)

An angel told Mary and Joseph that they were going to have a baby and Mary did give birth to the Son of God! It was a hard time for them, but God worked everything out. The angels told the shepherds who where grazing their sheep nearby that their Savior had been born. The Shepherds found the baby and praised God. They told everyone they knew about the new king. That was the very first Christmas.

(Hold up the craft stick star ornament.)

The wise men read the scriptures and knew that Jesus would be born in Bethlehem. They followed the star right to his house. When they finally found him they bowed down and worshipped him.

(Hold up the cross ornament)

But that isn't the whole story. The prophets also wrote about something else. They not only wrote about Jesus' birth, but about how Jesus would live and die. God had everything planned out from the beginning of time. He knew that man would sin, and that the only way we could be saved from our sins was to send his son to die for our sins. And everything happened exactly how it was written in the scriptures.

But that still isn't the end of the story. The prophets also wrote about how Jesus would come back to life again. He didn't stay dead. He arose from the dead, and he lives up in heaven with God today. If we believe in Jesus and accept him as our Savior we will live forever with God too. (Open your Bible and read John 3:16.)

(Hold up the butterfly ornament.)

When we ask Jesus into our hearts, he forgives us of our sins and we become brand new inside. He gets rid of all our sin. It is kind of like a butterfly that changes from a caterpillar. That is what the Christmas story is all about--not just his birth, but his dieing for us, and coming back to life so that we can be saved so we will live in heaven forever with him. This Christmas story just isn't about a baby being born on Christmas day; it is about God plan for us to live forever.

Crafts and Activities

1. Play Christmas Four-In-A-Row Game - Go to the Members Only Christmas section to print out the cards for this game.

To play place the picture cards in a bag and mix them up. Pull out one card at a time and show your children the picture. (You can let your children pick the cards if you would like.) Briefly explain what the picture has to do with the Christmas Story. Tell them to place a marker over that picture if it is on their card. The child to get four markers in a row, in any direction, wins.

If you have more than 13 children, print out more Four-In-A-Row Cards and two sets of picture cards. Use Highlighter markers to color some of the pictures on the second set of cards different colors. Color the same pictures on the extra Four-In-A-Row Cards to match the picture cards. You can also color some pictures on the other Four-In-A-Row Cards. When you show your children the pictures make sure you say, "red heart" or "blue bells". Only children with "red hearts" or "blue bells" can cover their pictures. If they have a card that has a heart or bell that isn't colored, they can't cover that picture. Even though some of your cards will have the same pictures, they will be different when you color some of the pictures different colors.

2. Make "Names of Christ Christmas Tree Craft" -

What you will need: One TP roll (or paper rolled to the size of a TP roll), green paper, scissors, glue, sequins or other decorative items.

What to do:

1. Cover a TP roll with brown paper to make the trunk of the tree.

2. Print out the branch patterns onto green paper and cut them out.
(Pattern 1, Pattern 2, and Pattern 3)

Problems Printing?

Have your children write the following names on the patterns starting with the biggest pattern and going to the smallest: Immanuel, Jesus, Saviour, and King. Do not write anything on the smallest pattern. Write " Son of God" on the star. Then glue the patterns into cone shapes.

3. Cut one-inch slits all the way around the bottom edge of each cone and curl up the edges by winding the edges around a pencil.

4. Place the largest cone shape on top of the TP roll. Then stack the remaining four on top of the largest, placing the smallest on top. Glue the star to the smallest cone. Glue sequins to the branches of the tree.

5. Review each lesson going over the Bible verses that go with each lesson, or see if your students can remember the Bible verse and lesson that goes with each word. For example, Immanuel comes from Isaiah 7:14 "shall call his name Immanuel". As you go over each word have your children stack the cone with that word on top of the previous cone to make the Christmas tree. If you don't have time for your children to do this craft, you can make ahead of time and just use it as a review. Let the children take turns place the cones on top of each other as you review the lessons.

Songs

Copyright © 2005 Carolyn Warvel
Danielle's Place of Crafts and Activities, http://www.daniellesplace.com

All rights reserved.   No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information or storage retrieval system, except for local church or school use only.  It is illegal to copy any of this material and publish on a newsgroup or other Internet web site. This copyright notice must be included on all copies. Requests for permission to copy this material for any other uses should be addressed to Carolyn Warvel, 588 Duran Street, Henderson, NV  89015 or e-mail me at care@daniellesplace.com

Comments

We would love to hear your comments about this lesson. If you taught this lesson, we would love to hear how it went, if you changed anything, added anything, what age you taught and was it appropriate.  Any comments that would help others teach this lesson are welcome.