What is taught must be in accordance with the locally agreed syllabus; (If your school is outside of Cambridgeshire: the S.C.A.A Model 2 syllabus has been included to help in matching this lesson plan with your local Agreed Syllabus).
Cambs Agreed Syllabus:
PE (People)
Enable pupils to:
continue to explore some of the beliefs Christians have about Jesus, part 3
Pupils should consider this:
Why do people believe different things?
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S.C.A.A. Model syllabuses:
KEY TEACHINGS / FOCUS:
JESUS
AT1 Talk about & discuss the ... stories about
his life.
AT2 Discuss the answers offered by Christianity to questions of meaning & purpose in life.
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RESOURCES:
Print off 'Rule cards to get to heaven' sheet & cut into 6.
STARTER:
I want you to imagine that you are playing a game of monoply, or Cluedo, or whatever your favourite game is. You are playing the game with your normal friends or family, but there is one new person there who you don't know. Suddenly this new person says that the way you are playing the game is wrong! Everyone else disagrees, but this new person picks up the rules to the game & proves that everyone is playing it incorrectly!
This rule was so important to the game, that it meant the game had to be abandoned, because the new person had been following the correct rules & everyone else hadn't.
I now want you to imagine another situation. The little village of ................ (Teachers note: a nearby village) has decided to drive on the right hand side of the road. Everyone else in the country drives on the left.
This doesn't cause too many problems for the villagers because everyone knows.
But when the main roads through the village get busier with outside traffic, it becomes total chaos, & the roads get blocked with dented cars. No-one can move in or out of the village, because some cars are driving on the left, some on the right & they are meeting cars coming towards them, some on the left some on the right. There is nowhere to move to.
But then a policeman walks into the village & says "Oi, why are you driving on the right? And you! And you! And you! You should all be driving on the left side of the road!"
But the villagers say, "No! We've all agreed to travel on the right, so it's all these people who are wrong!"
Q. Who do you think is right?
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Q. What do you think the Policeman will say?
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The Policeman has got the authority & power of the Law, so he will enforce those Laws if people try to do anything different. It doesn't matter what they have agreed with each other. The Authority making the Law has to be obeyed, if not the consequences will have to be paid for.
We are now going to look at a situation at the time of Jesus.
Jesus Christ was like the Policeman walking into that village, or that new person turning up at the Monopoly game. We are going to find out why:
MAIN TEACHING:
The religious leaders of that time tried to follow all of God's Laws & they had many laws of their own which had evolved over the years. Some of their laws even contradicted God's Laws!
So these were the sort of rules that the Religious Leaders were playing by:
(Teachers note: Show the card: [1] 'Religious Leaders Rule Card to get to heaven' & read it out.)
Q. Have any of you killed anybody lately?
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So, most of the people followed what the religious leaders said & they attended the Temple.
(Teachers note: Show the card: [2] 'Religious Leaders Response Card' & read it out.)
Most of the people trusted that these religious leaders knew the 'rules to the game.'
But this was no game!
If these leaders got it wrong, then it would mislead millions of people who thought they were going to heaven.
Suddenly there was a new person & the religious leaders didn't know where he had come from. Remember how we started the lesson, with the game of Monopoly & a new person was playing.
Suddenly this new person, called Jesus, said that the religious leaders hadn't understood the correct rules, & what they were doing was wrong! There was an uproar! The religious leaders disagreed with Jesus.
Jesus wasn't interested in the religious leaders rules, He was only interested in God's rules, which are the 'Official Rules'.
Let's illustrate in simple terms what Jesus was saying:
(Teachers note: Show the card: [3] 'The Official Rules Card to get to heaven' & read it out.)
That was almost identical to what the religious leaders read out.
Q. What was different about it?
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Two things were different:
1) The religious leaders had put in, as an extra, about obeying any additional rules that they made up.
2) The religious leaders didn't mention about looking at an 'Official Rules Information Card'.
I wonder what it says.
(Teachers note: Show the card: [4] 'The Official Rules Information Card' & read it out.)
Perhaps I had better ask the question again, that I asked earlier:
Q. Have any of you killed anybody lately?
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But perhaps, with this new insight into this rule, I had better ask:
Q. Has anybody not killed anybody - ever - in their thoughts? !!
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Perhaps we had better read the 'Official Rules Help Card'
(Teachers note: Show the card: [5] 'The Official Rules Help Card' & read it out.)
Oh, we'd better quickly move to the 'The Official Rules Response Card'
(Teachers note: Show the card: [6] 'The Official Rules Response Card' & read it out.)
Q. So what was the difference between what the religious leaders were saying & what Jesus was saying? Say it in a simply way.
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The religious leaders were saying:
You need to obey all the rules. Your own strength will achieve this.
Jesus was saying:
You need to obey all of God's rules. You need to surrender to Him, so that He will achieve it.
It was just like Jesus had picked up the official rules to the game,& had just proved that everybody was playing the game incorrectly!
But this was no game, Jesus was reading the 'official rules' out of the Scriptures, & He proved that most people had an incorrect view.
The religious leaders verbally attacked Jesus, but they didn't win any arguements, because He quoted from the Scriptures, which were the 'Official rules'.
There were a few religious leaders who took Jesus' teaching seriously, but they were having trouble understanding what Jesus was saying, because their minds were so stuck in their religious traditions. They were also afraid of what the others would say about it, so they kept quiet.
But one of them, called Nicodemus, came secretly to see Jesus at night, & said:
"Sir, we know that you are a Teacher sent from God. Your miracles are proof enough of this."
Nicodemus must have been feeling fairly confident in his position as an important spiritual leader, so Jesus replied,
"I speak the Truth. Unless you are born again you will never see the Kingdom of God."
Q. Nicodemus was religious & he thought he was either in the Kingdom of God, or that he was heading towards it. So how would he have reacted to that?
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He probably would have been very offended by that remark!
"Born again!" spluttered Nicodemus. "What do you mean? How can I, an old man, go back into my mother's womb and be born for the second time?"
Jesus replied, "I speak the Truth. No-one can enter the Kingdom of God unless they are born again by the Spirit & Word of God. Human life can only reproduce human life, but the Spirit of God reproduces a spiritual life."
Q. Do you agree that "human life can only reproduce human life"? ....Or has your mum given birth to a chimpanzee or a giraffe lately? !!
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So it would make sense that only the "Spirit of God reproduces a spiritual life."
Q. But what does a 'spiritual life' mean?
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Remember what Jesus had said to Nicodemus earlier.
He was talking about seeing & entering the Kingdom of God. So a spiritual life is living within the Kingdom of God.
The Kingdom of God has a King, who is the 3 Persons of God: Father, Son & Holy Spirit. (Teachers note: The Trinity is covered in Lesson Plan 24 'The biblical stories retold during Lent and Pentecost')
And the Kingdom of God has willing people who want to serve their King.
Q. But how does anyone get this 'spiritual life' -how does anyone get into the Kingdom of God?
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The answer is that God will give the new spiritual life to any who turn to Him. God will get that person into the Kingdom of God, because "the Spirit of God reproduces a spiritual life."
Jesus continued talking to Nicodemus:
"So don't be surprised at my statement that you must be born again! The wind blows about but we're never sure where it has come from, or where it will exactly go next. So it is with the Spirit of God, He gives spiritual life & no-one can predict His movements."
"What do you mean?" Nicodemus asked.
Q. Do you think Nicodemus was still feeling like a confident religious leader?
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Jesus replied, "You are a respected religious teacher, & yet you don't understand what I am saying? I speak the Truth. I speak from what I know & from what I have seen, but you leaders still don't believe Me.
I have spoken about things that happen here on the earth, so how would you ever believe Me if I told you what happens in heaven? For only I, the Son of God, have come from heaven to earth and I will return to heaven again."
Q. Which out of Nicodemus or Jesus, do you think knows what they are talking about? Why?
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Jesus then revealed the plan for getting people into the Kingdom of God:
He explained how Moses hundreds of years earlier in the wilderness, had obeyed God by making a bronze snake which he put on top of a tall pole.
The Israelites were being killed by many poisonous snakes, so when anyone was bitten by one they looked at the bronze snake on the pole, & because of their faith they were saved from dying. (Exodus 21:7-9)
Jesus then explained that He was going to be lifted up on a pole & in a similar way, anyone who looked to Him with faith would be saved & would receive eternal life.
Then He said: "For God loved the world so much that he gave His only Son so that anyone who believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life." (John 3:1-16)
Q. What similarities can you see between the bronze snake & Jesus?
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Both were lifted up on a pole for all to see.
Both gave life from death. (But the life Jesus gives is an everlasting life in heaven).
Both required faith to believe that they would be saved from death.
Both were solutions provided for by God. He answered the need.
We don't know how Nicodemus reacted to what Jesus said at this meeting, but a little later he tried to stop the rest of the religious leaders from being so hasty in judging Jesus. (John 7:50)
Then after Jesus was crucified, Nicodemus was one of two people who lovingly took Jesus' body away from the Roman soldiers & laid His body in a tomb. (John 19:39)
So this new person, called Jesus, told the religious leaders that they didn't understand the correct 'official' rules. In fact, the rules they followed made it a totally different 'game'. Their understanding of the rules made it a totally different religion & one that was working against what God wanted.
Only a few of these leaders believed in Jesus & Nicodemus was one of them.
PLENARY:
Q. Why do people believe different things?
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Q. Why did the religious leaders at that time understand the rules differently?
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Q. How does the teachings of Jesus Christ give meaning & purpose to life?
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Either take a short time to discuss these questions, or leave it with them.
(Teachers note: There is a worksheet to accompany this lesson plan).