Obedience: Jonah and the Whale

Obedience.

It's so hard to obey.

We have to die to our wants and desires and do what God wants us to do.

A heart that desires obedience is what I want for my kids.

What parent doesn't want their child to obey them?

However obedience stems from love, and in order to obey, you must know that the person you are obeying loves you and is looking out for your best interests.

Experience God's study this month is all about OBEDIENCE 

through the story of Jonah and the whale.

Our Experience God pack from Mother Goose Time came with all the supplies to make a boat and Jonah puppet, a whale, an obedience banner and a Jonah and the Whale coloring book.  Not to mention all the teacher supplies, like 4 story cards and a memory verse  (Ephesians 6:1)

Here's what we did:

First I read the story of Jonah and the Whale that is printed on the back of the 4 story cards.

There were parts we acted out, like when Jonah was thrown off the ship and into the sea, we made a throwing motion with our arms.

After reading our story, we took each story card and just focused on that part of Jonah's adventure.  

I placed the story card in front of my girl and let her color the coloring sheet the goes along with it.  While she colored, I asked questions or retold that part of the story.

 

After coloring her sheet, it was time to do the craft that went with that part of the story.

We made the Jonah and the boat puppet, the whale, and the obedience banner.

The craft pack also came with games you can play at home.  My girl is way into playing matching games lately so we played Match Jonah to the Whale at least 3 times.  

We will play more tonight when daddy comes home...I'm sure. :)

I wanted to see how much she actually retained and remembered, so I had her tell me about Jonah and the boat using her puppets.  Here's her take on it (1 minute long):

I love hearing her retell stories.

With her coloring book, we went page by page and I dictated what she said about that part of the story on that particular coloring page.  At times, I asked her questions like, "How do you think Jonah felt in the whale's stomach?" or "How long was Jonah in the body of the whale?"

  But she used some words that she heard when I told her the story, like "expelled" when describing how the whale threw Jonah up.  I was impressed.

We spent about an hour and a half doing all of this this morning.

I usually space out our Experience God stuff throughout the month, but we've been so captivated with all our Ocean Commotion activities, that our Experience God stuff has been put to the side.  

However, yesterday at church, she learned the same Ephesians 6:1 verse and made a flower with petals describing how to obey.

Today was quite the perfect day to do our Jonah study.

And there are still 16 more activities and 3 home games we haven't even touched yet! 

Want to learn more about our Experience God adventures? Click here.

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