Family Faith and Fun on Fridays: Advent Apples- Where Christmas REALLY Begins
For the word of God is alive and powerful. It is sharper than the sharpest two-edged sword, cutting between soul and spirit, between joint marrow. It exposes our innermost thoughts and desires. -Hebrews 4:12
Welcome to Family Faith and Fun Fridays! As the week winds down and I anticipate more family time over the weekend, I often ask God for one good idea that will enable me to bring the Word to life and bring our family together. Usually, the activity overflows out of something the Lord has been teaching me through His Word during the week. I’d like to invite you to join me and my family in the adventure. Sometimes I’ll post things we’ve tried; other times I’ll post an idea in the works. If you’ve got thoughts to add or suggestions on how to adapt or improve the activity, please don’t hesitate to comment. Enjoy!
Advent Apples: Where Christmas
REALLY Begins
As we use our Jesse Tree to explore the BIG STORY of Christmas,I’ve found myself freshly amazed at the beauty of God’s perfect plan. From the start of time, God knew that we would need a rescuer. God’s ultimate gift of His only son was not a last-ditch effort to save us when all other plans went awry. It was the plan from the beginning. When God planted the tree in the middle of the Garden of Eden, He knew that the fruit it bore would be the trap Satan set for Eve and the fall of mankind.
“Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”
The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’”
“You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.
Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the LORD God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the LORD God among the trees of the garden. But the LORD God called to the man, “Where are you?”
He answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.”
And he said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?”
The man said, “The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.”
Then the LORD God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?”
The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.” -Genesis 3:1-13
Then into the perfect world God had created came the curse (Genesis 3:14-19.) Death and toil. Struggle and suspicion. Poverty and pain.
Yet even as He clothed His naughty children in animal skins, the Lord knew that one day REDEMPTION would come clothed in flesh. HOPE would arrive swaddled in humble rags and placed in a manger, his own Son.
Anne Voskamp writes: “Can you hear the whisper in the wind: Jesus! Christmas has been coming right from the very beginning! We who are fallen and messy and bitten by sin will be bandaged and washed and made whole. We who ate from the tree and tasted death, we will feed on Jesus, bread from heaven, who came to die on a tree so that we can taste life. And we who in our sin are exposed and naked and ashamed and afraid of God, will have a lamb, Jesus, who will clothe us in clean skin, drape us in purity, let us wear Himself, so we might run right home again, into the arms of God.” (Jesse Tree Devotional Dec. 2)
And so this weekend as you celebrate His story– the story of Christmas that began long before Black Friday and Cyber Monday, before Bethlehem’s intrusion and the wise men’s arduous journey– perhaps you’ll want to take a peek at God’s from-the-beginning grace.
Show your kids an apple and talk about the fall- how Eve believed Satan’s lies instead of God’s love and she picked the forbidden fruit from the tree God had asked her not to touch. Discuss how the fall changed everything, how it ripped apart God’s perfect world and created a rift between Heaven and earth.
Then remind your children that God had a plan in place to fix that rip from the very beginning. Read John 3:16 and slice the apple in half horizontally. Ask your kids what they see in the apple’s middle: A STAR.
Even when God planted the fruit that Eve would eat, He knew He would one day light the sky over a stable in Bethlehem with a special star, a light that would lead His children to the Savior. “When they saw the star, they were overjoyed” Matthew 2: 11
Oh, what a story! Glory! Glory!“the darkness is passing and the true light is already shining” -I John 2:8
You always have the best Family Devotionals! I love this one and everyone! Your an amazing mom…and I’m lucky to know that you are an amazing friend as well!