Week 327 · about 45 minutes
2 Samuel 21
2 Samuel 21 · Memory verse 2 Samuel 21:3
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Queues the lesson plan, this story’s coloring page (2 Samuel 21), the matching word search and answer key (2 Samuel 21 word search), the memory-verse tracer, and a parent slip.
Five-minute object lesson
Prop: a folded cloth
Hold a folded cloth. Read 2 Samuel 21 in about four minutes, stopping at 2 Samuel 21:3: “and David said to the Gibeonites, “What should I do for you? And with what should I make atonement, that you may bless Yahweh’s inheritance?”” Ask, “What does this prop have to do with 2 Samuel 21?” Let two children answer, then say the memory verse together.
Story script
2 Samuel 21 is a real chapter from the Old Testament. It starts, “There was a famine in the days of David for three years, year after year; and David sought the face of Yahweh. Yahweh said, “It is for Saul, and for his bloody house, because he put the Gibeonites to death.”” That is not a motto invented for a poster. It is the first sentence a family hears when this page is opened at night.
Keep going a little further. The chapter also says, “So David went and took the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan his son from the men of Jabesh Gilead, who had stolen them from the street of Beth Shan, where the Philistines had hanged them, in the day that the Philistines killed Saul in Gilboa;” 2 Samuel 21 opens with these words: “There was a famine in the days of David for three years, year after year; and David sought the face of Yahweh. Yahweh said, “It is for…” The line to keep is 2 Samuel 21:3: “and David said to the Gibeonites, “What should I do for you? And with what should I make atonement, that you may bless Yahweh’s inheritance?”” Carry the word “david” from that verse into the rest of the day.
The line worth learning out loud is 2 Samuel 21:3: “and David said to the Gibeonites, “What should I do for you? And with what should I make atonement, that you may bless Yahweh’s inheritance?”” If the rest of the chapter feels crowded, hold that one sentence until the room is quiet.
What happens first in 2 Samuel 21? Then try this: Read “and David said to the Gibeonites, “What should I do for you? And with what should I make atonement, that you…” once more. What does it show you about God? You do not have to finish every verse. You can close the book after the memory verse and still have read the Bible together.
Group game
Walk the room as if you are moving through 2 Samuel 21. Every time you freeze, a child says one word from 2 Samuel 21:3. The last child says the whole verse.
Craft
On a US Letter sheet, draw one picture from 2 Samuel 21 and write 2 Samuel 21:3 under it. Send it home as tonight’s reminder, not as a decoration contest.
Memory verse
2 Samuel 21:3
“and David said to the Gibeonites, “What should I do for you? And with what should I make atonement, that you may bless Yahweh’s inheritance?””
Take-home prayer
Father, thank you for 2 Samuel 21. Help us remember 2 Samuel 21:3 when we wake up, and teach us to notice you in an ordinary night. Amen.