Time, Talents, and 20’s Lesson #3

Time Talents, and 20’s Lesson #3 – Money

Introduction: Which Costs More?

Clarifications:

• Amount of money does not determine your value
• Money and possessions are not bad in and of themselves

Why talk about money to Youth? – You all have some amount of money (jobs, allowances, gifts, etc). – Many of you are beginning to think about what career/college path you will pursue – often money plays some sort of role in this decision. –Money is something you can’t avoid and we are called to understand money through the lens of what we say we believe.

Purpose: To show that money is a gift from God that can be used to enjoy this life and be a blessing to other people, and to caution students on how easy it is to turn money (and possessions) into an idol.

Big Idea: Money is a gift from God that can point us to God, reveal what we truly value, and be used to build God’s kingdom.

 Primary Passages – Matthew 6:19-24; 1 Timothy 6:17-19

Time, Talents, and 20’s Lesson #2

Time, Talents, and 20’s Lesson #2 – Talents:

• Introduction: Jimmy Kimmel Christmas Gifts youtube video and Steven Wiltshire youtube video.
• Most of us probably don’t have the same skill of Stephen Wiltshire, but that doesn’t mean that God has overlooked us and given us terrible gifts as the parents did in the first video.

• Define talent: A special natural ability or aptitude.

• Big Idea: God calls us to be faithful to him as we discover and use the natural abilities that he has given to us.

• Explain Passage: This passage is a parable that Jesus spoke concerning the resources God has entrusted to us and how we are called to use those resources during our time here on earth as we await his returns. Talents in this passage is not speaking of our natural abilities but rather of a financial weight that was used in Jesus’ era. It is a large sum of money. I believe it signifies the resources that God entrusts to us. So while this broadly covers all the things God has given to us, I want to look at the specific applications it has for the natural abilities that God has given us.

• Read Matthew 25:14-30

• The parable is made up of 3 scenes
• Scene One explains that the master entrusts three servants with a certain amount of his money as he leaves to go away on a long journey. He gives five talents to one servant, two talents to another servant, and one talent to a third servant. We are not told why this is the case.
• Scene Two explains what each of the servants did with what was given to them. The first and the second go to work with what they’ve been given and double the amount. The third servant sticks out because he instead goes and digs and hole and puts the money in the ground.
• Scene Three explains the masters return and his response to what each servant has done with what was given. The first and second servants are praised for their faithfulness, and rewarded with more responsibility and “entering in to the joy of the master.” The third servant comes to God explaining that because of his view of the master he simply buried his money in the ground until the master returned.

 

Time: Forever Young

Time, Talents, and 20’s: Lesson #1 Time: Forever Young

• Transition activities:
  • “Race the Tube” Video
  • “Minute to Win-it”

• Introduction to series: In this series we are going to take a look at three of the common gifts that God gives to all of us. He gives these gifts in different forms and measures, but we have all been given these gifts. We are going to look at how these gifts point us to God and how they only find their proper place as we understand that knowing God is the supreme gift. To do this, we must see the greatness of Jesus Christ in relation to these three gifts. Each weak we will look at a gift – how we enjoy that gift without letting it replace God – and how Jesus is great in relation to this gift.

• First of all, we are going to look at time. There are many directions we could’ve went with this message but I want to specifically look at the time we have been given as Youth. I still consider myself in this category (although after waking up in soreness for two days following the Dodgeball Tournament, perhaps I should remove myself from this category). I want to look specifically at a passage that talks about our years as youth and gives us some wisdom as to how they are best spent and why they are a gift.