I have blogged before about the Advent material that I have written over the years. There are three different sets now. This post will give an brief explanation of each, to assist you in choosing whether you would like to use one of them.
Each is a set of 24 readings, designed to be used from Dec 1 - 24 (leaving Christmas Day itself free to celebrate in your own way!) Each day takes no more than 5-10 minutes, although some optional extra activities could take longer.
The Birth of Jesus
This is aimed more at younger children, although still can be used with older ones. It covers the story of the first Christmas.
Each day has a bible reading, questions to think about, a prayer to say and some optional activities which include a special verse, a picture to draw and sometimes a song to sing (if you have the optional CD: King of Christmas (Colin Buchanan, 2005).
Genesis to Jesus
This is possibly better with primary-aged children, although we used it with little ones too. It covers the story of the Old Testament and then how the promises lead to Jesus.
Each day has a bible reading, questions to think about, a prayer to say and some optional activities which include a special verse, a picture to draw and sometimes a song to sing (if you have the optional CDs: King of Christmas, Colin Buchanan (Colin Buchanan, 2005) and The King, the Snake and the Promise (Emu Music, 1998).
Who is this Man?
Each reading brings out an aspect of who Jesus is: such as in the image of God, the word become flesh, son of God, creator, unchangeable, light of the world, good shepherd, etc.
We used this last year with our children (aged 12, 10 and 8) and it pushed them all a little bit more. However we knew people who also used it with much younger children and they also found it helpful. There are no activities or daily drawing suggestions with this material, but they could be added if wanted.
If you want to see how we have used these three sets of material over the years, reading back through the Advent posts will show you. We have boxes we open each day, which is a family tradition we now all love - but what goes in the boxes changes over the years.
I hope your family enjoys thinking about Jesus over the Christmas season.
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