During the lesson, the information for you to know is written in regular type, and what we suggest speaking or reading aloud to children is in bold. All resources for this lesson, including the Teacher Guide, Student Page, Family Connection Card, and other resources can be downloaded in a ZIP file by clicking on the following link:
In some lessons you will find "resource articles." These are articles written by experts from around the world to help equip you for your work with children and adolescents. Share them with parents or guardians if you consider it appropriate.
My God, I know that you tested our hearts. And you are pleased when we are honest. I’ve given all these things just because I wanted to. When I did it, I was completely honest with you. Your people here have also been willing to give to you. And I’ve been happy to see this.
1 Chronicles 29:17
What does God desire of us? To answer this, let’s first look at the qualities the Holy Spirit brings to our lives. Honesty, truthfulness, and goodness are all parts of our lives when we are made new in our belief in Jesus Christ. When God tests our hearts, He is pleased with these qualities. He looks deep inside our hearts to find what we desire and how we wish to live our lives. He also looks at our actions to see if our lives reflect what is in our hearts.
Examine your heart. Do you desire to live in a way that is honest? What can you do to be more aware of what you say to others? Do you want others to be honest with you? It is not always easy to speak the truth to others, and it can be difficult to do what is right in every situation. Ask God to help you to live in a way that honours truth and honesty. Let Him guide your life!
Encourage families to talk about what truth is. Ask them to think about how being honest could help them in certain situations.
Teacher Tip: If possible, email or text the Family Connection Card to the families of your students.
Greet the children as they come to class. Ask them to sit in 2 groups. Once all of the children have been seated, make sure both groups have approximately the same number of children. Have the groups turn so they are facing each other.
Let’s play a game. You are all sitting with your team. The children to the right of me will be Team Green and the children to the left of me will be Team Orange. I will read a situation. Then, I will give you some options. Your team will discuss each option and choose the one you would like to use to respond to the situation. Each team will tell me which option they chose. Let’s try this together.
Situation 1: You are home alone. You are thirsty and get a glass of water. It slips out of your hand and it breaks! You clean up the mess. Your mother comes home and gets a glass of water. She notices a glass is missing. What will you do?
Give the groups 2 minutes to choose an answer. Then, ask someone from each group to share their answer. If needed, read the possible responses again for the groups.
You could respond to the situation in any of the ways I mentioned. However, only 1 answer explained the truth about what happened.
Allow 1–2 children to respond.
If you tell your mother you broke the glass, you are telling the truth. While this response might get you in trouble, it is the right thing to do because you told the truth. Let’s try another situation.
Situation 2: Your little sister asks you to help her find her toy. You remember that you broke her toy last week when you were angry at her. You hid the broken toy so she would not see it. What will you do now?
Give the groups 2 minutes to decide on an answer. Then, ask someone from each group to respond. Repeat which choice each group made before asking the class the following question.
Option 2: You find her toy and tell her you broke it.
Some of you may have thought about choosing Option 3 because not saying anything at all does not seem like a lie. However, in this situation you know what happened to the toy and you know your sister is looking for it. By offering to look for the toy but not telling your sister what happened, you are not telling her the truth. Being honest means telling the truth and doing the right thing.
If one or both teams responded with the truth, congratulate the children on the team or teams and tell them they won the game! If neither team responded with the truth, it is okay. The children will learn more about the importance of telling the truth in this lesson.
We just learned that being honest means telling the truth and doing the right thing. What is truth? The truth includes real facts and information about a thing, person, or event. When someone tells the truth, that person talks about the events that actually happened to him or to someone else.
Let’s play a game about finding true information. I will read a statement out loud. When you hear a fact that you know is true, stand up. When you hear something that you know is not true, sit down.
Make sure that all of the children are sitting down before you begin reading the following statements. Pause for a few seconds after reading each statement to allow the children to respond.
Good job picking out the true facts! Some of the facts I said were true about our class and others were not. When you tell the truth, you talk about facts that describe a person, thing, or event. In our game, it was easy to tell which facts were true. However, it is not always easy to know the difference between what is true and what is not. Listen to what the Bible says about what it means to tell the truth.
Sometimes, in order to tell the truth, you must learn more about something or someone. If you say things about people or events without having enough information, you may accidentally say something that is not true. This is different than saying something that is not true on purpose, but it is still not true. When you lie and talk about things that are not true on purpose, you are not honest. This is called being dishonest.
Read this verse directly from your Bible.
My God, I know that you tested our hearts. And you are pleased when we are honest.
1 Chronicles 29:17a
God wants us to be honest in what we do and say. This verse reminds us that God knows what is in our hearts. He knows what we want to do, and He is pleased when we can do what is right and honest.
I will tell you a story. When you hear someone in the story being honest, clap 2 times. When you hear someone being dishonest, stomp your feet 2 times.
Ian’s family raises chickens. Ian takes care of the hens each day after school. One day, his sister Valary came with him to collect the eggs from the hens. On her way to the house, Valary dropped her basket of eggs! When their mother asked where the eggs were, Ian told her a hyena ate them (stomp 2 times). Valary did not say anything because she knew her brother was trying to keep both of them out of trouble (stomp 2 times). Their mother questioned Ian about the hyena.
“Did the hyena eat any of the hens?” she asked. Ian replied that all of the hens were safe because he walked in the house and scared the hyena away (stomp 2 times).
“Did the hyena hurt you?” his mother asked. Ian explained that he was fine. His mother knew he was lying about the hyena. Either the hyena would have eaten a hen or it would have attacked her son. Finally, Valary could no longer stay quiet! She told her mother what really happened (clap 2 times). From that day on, whenever something happened, the children’s mother always asked Valary what happened. She trusted her daughter to tell the truth.
In our story, both children could have been in trouble for breaking the eggs.
She trusted her daughter.
Her daughter told the truth even though she might have gotten in trouble for breaking a basket of eggs.
Telling the truth helps people to trust you. It is also what God wants us to do. Honest people do their best to tell the truth and do the right thing in every situation. When you try to be honest, you honour God.
Let’s listen to what the Bible says about God’s honesty.
He is the Rock. His works are perfect. All his ways are right. He is faithful. He doesn’t do anything wrong. He is honest and fair.
Deuteronomy 32:4
God is perfect and honest. He does not do anything wrong. He is fair.
God is perfect! God is always honest. You can trust God because He always tells the truth. Do you remember when we learned about the promise God made to send a Saviour to help us? God did what He said He would do because God is honest. The Bible also tells us that God wants to help us to be honest.
The Lord is honest and good. He teaches sinners to walk in his ways.
Psalm 25:8
Allow 2–3 children to respond. Responses may include: God is honest with us. God teaches us to be more like Him.
This verse tells us that God can teach us to be more like Him. When you are honest in what you do and say, you live in a way that is pleasing to God. If you try to tell the truth and you try to do things that are right, God will know that this is the way you want to live. Being honest is not always easy, but it is very important!
In the coming weeks, we will learn why it is so important to be honest and tell the truth.
To help you remember what you learned today about truth and honesty, let’s create a song together. To help us with the lyrics, I will ask you a few questions.
For each of the following questions, allow the children to answer using their own words. Their ideas should be similar to the suggested answers, but it is very important to use the children’s words. In this way, they will feel they have contributed to the song–creation process. Write down what they say or ask the class to remember the words each child says. Use these words when you sing the song with the children.
The truth is real facts and information about something, someone, or an event.
You should always try to tell the truth.
Honesty means wanting to tell the truth and do the right thing.
It is important to be honest because this honours God and helps other people to trust us.
Teach the children this statement to use within your song: “What God says is always true! God is honest, and I can be too.” You may want to include it in the last line of the song.
Now let’s sing the song we just made!
Choose a melody or rhythm that is familiar to most of your children. Use the lyrics your children created instead of the usual song lyrics. You may choose to sing the song more than once if time allows.
Optional: If you are using Student Pages, give the children crayons and allow 2–3 minutes for them to draw or write ways they can be honest.
Today, you learned about truth and what it means to be honest. Our memory verse today reminds us to be honest and speak the truth.
Show the Memory Verse poster if you are using it.
My God, I know that you tested our hearts. And you are pleased when we are honest.
1 Chronicles 29:17a
Let’s make our memory verse into a song!
Sing the words to the Bible verse with the children. You can use a familiar song or create your own. Have the children repeat the song with you 3 times. Remember the song so you can sing it again for each lesson about truth and honesty.
End class by saying this blessing, based on 1 Chronicles 29:17a and Psalm 25:8, over the children.
Blessing: May you desire to speak the truth. May God work in you to help you to be honest.
Lead the students in singing this quarter’s song, if possible.
Life on Life ©2020 David C Cook. Reproducible for home or classroom use only. All other uses require written permission from David C Cook [email protected]. All rights reserved.
