Tag Archives: God

Kids Devotion: Love Puts Others First

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Download the Others First Coloring Sheet here.

Bible Verse: “Value others more than yourselves. ” – Philippians 2:3b (NIrV)

If you have a brother or sister, you know how important the word first can be.  After all, siblings can be really competitive.  Maybe you’ve heard some of these phrases around your house or at school:

  • I want to go first.
  • I get first pick.
  • Let me have the first piece.
  • No fair!  Why is she always first?

All this wanting to be first causes fights, jealousy and hurt feelings. Worst of all, it gets in the way of loving others. 

The Bible, however, talks about someone who went first in a good way! Jesus! He loved us first before we loved Him. Now we get to give that love away.

1 John 4:19 says, “We love because he loved us first” (NIrV). 

Jesus put others first in all kinds of ways. He served others and did the jobs no one else wanted to do. He spent time with people no one else liked, and He told people the truth about God even when He knew it would get Him in trouble. 

Of course, the biggest way Jesus put others first is when He gave up His life on the cross so we could become forgiven friends of God.He loved us first, and now it’s our turn to love others by putting them first too. 

In Philippians 2:3, a Jesus follower named Paul said if you want to be like Jesus, you should, “Value others more than yourselves” (NIrV).

How do you do that? Let your brother have the first piece of cake. Let your sister pick the first toy. Let someone else go first in the board game or be first in line at school.

They may be confused why you are being so kind and loving. If they are, just point to the Bible and explain, “Jesus did it first!”

Take the You First Challenge:  For a whole week let others go first and see what happens.

Prayer: God, thank You for loving me. Please help me to love other people by putting them first even when it’s hard. Amen.

Sign up for the True Tale Trail newsletter for more family devotions, Bible podcast episodes, activity pages and more.

Check out my new picture book, Where’s God? A Psalm 139 Story.

Kids Devotion: Better Than a Groundhog

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Download the Groundhog Day Coloring Sheet.

God is our place of safety. He gives us strength. He is always there to help us in times of trouble. – Psalm 46:1 (NIrV)

Happy Groundhog Day! Groundhog Day isn’t a big holiday like Christmas or Thanksgiving, but just a silly day people celebrate just for fun.

Here’s how it works. According to superstition, if the groundhog sees his shadow on Groundhog Day, we will have six more weeks of cold, winter weather. However, if he doesn’t see his shadow, it will mean we’re in for an early spring.  

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True Tale Trail Episode 7: Thanksgiving Episode

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Listen now to the new episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or Amazon Music.

Happy Thanksgiving! To help you prepare your kids for Thanksgiving week we have a fun episode of the True Tale Trail podcast that’s all about turkeys! What do turkeys have to do with the Bible?

Well, as it turns out turkeys have incredible eyesight. They can see almost all the way around themselves (a 270 degree field of vision!) and can see ultraviolet light undetected by the human eye! In other words, turkeys can spot things people miss.

Unfortunately, that’s not all we humans miss. Sometimes we miss out on God’s activity and blessings in our lives too! All too often our eyes are focused on ourselves instead of on God and His goodness.

In today’s episode we’ll be talking about developing thankful hearts and thankful eyes that see how good God has been to us! When we train ourselves to look for God’s blessings — big and small — we start to see them everywhere. We call that having thankful eyes, and it changes everything.

Download the “Thankful Eyes Worksheet” to send your kids on a thankfulness scavenger hunt looking for good things God has placed in their lives.

Download this week’s Family Discussion Guide to talk more about this episode together at home.

If you missed last’ week’s episode about the thankful man from Luke 17, check it out here.

Sign up here for the True Tale Trail Newsletter to get family discussion guides sent straight to your inbox.