All-Stars Accessories Overstock Sale This Week!

Save 15% on all All-Stars for Jesus Pennants, T-shirts, ball caps, award books, and more. Plus get FREE shipping on your All-Stars order. Use Coupon Code ASFJ15 in the coupon box when you order online or mention the code when you call.


Don't miss this chance to stock up on those fun items and incentives for  your Bible club. It's easy to start an affordable Bible Awards Program for your kids. Encourage Bible learning at home, no matter which curriculum you're using! The students learn important Bible verses and Biblical concepts while completing a variety of fun and creative activities and projects. The All-Stars for Jesus stand-alone awards program gives your leaders a chance to work one-on-one with kids and involve parents in your program.

The optional Awards Program is an important part of an All-Stars for Jesus Bible club. Completing a variety of activities in the award book (memorizing Scripture, at-home-projects, puzzles, etc.) reinforces what a child has been learning at All-Stars for Jesus, and gets the family involved, too. Children may earn colorful T-shirts, caps, pennants, and iron-on awards by working in their award books. Take advantage of this limited-time sale offer and order your accessories today. Visit ChristianEdWarehouse.com to view all of these great items.

Healthy Snacks

As you plan your Bible lesson, look for healthy snacks for your students. Make sure none of your students have allergies to any of the foods you serve. If someone does have an allergy, it's best not to bring that food into your classroom at all. Here are a few tasty and healthy snack suggestions to serve your students:

Fruit slices
Cheese and crackers
Yogurt and carrot sticks
Cucumber slices
Canteloup and watermelon
Pita bread quarters with turkey
Jicama sticks with hummus
Grapes and berries
Applesauce with pretzel sticks
Flavored gelatin
Granola bars
Blueberry or bran muffins
Fruit smoothies
Frozen fruit pops
Red and green sweet pepper slices
Snap peas with light ranch dip
Tortilla chips with guacamole or salsa
Olives, fig or date halves
Mango slices and strawberries or raspberries

Before eating, have your students thank God for providing such an abundance of flavors, colors, and textures for us to enjoy eating. Encourage the children to try just one bite of new and different foods. Have your older students take turns serving each other and saying "please" and "thank you." Even your youngest students can be encouraged to throw away their napkins and paper cups in the trash when they are finished. Compliment the children for being helpers.

Halloween Alternatives

If you're looking for Halloween alternatives, harvest ideas, a Thanksgiving program, fall festival games, crafts, and outreach ideas, take a look at the Church Family Harvest Celebration outreach program with lots of reproducibles on CD-ROM. (Including the coloring pages shown below.)

This easy-to-use program guide with CD-ROM tells you all you need to know—whether you've been planning church events for 25 years or this is your first time! Includes promotion and programming ideas, recipes for refreshments, games, craft instruction sheets, recipes, and lots more. Take a look at the contents and view sample pages from the Church Family Harvest Celebration.

Here are just a few of the ways you can use this flexible program:

• Fall Festival, Thanksgiving, or Halloween alternative suggestions
• Harvest puppet show script
• Christ-centered games and crafts
• Pumpkin-carving ideas
• Instant Harvest pageant on the story of Ruth
• Step-by-step instructions for planning and set-up
• Reproducible instruction sheets and patterns
• Quick and easy decorations and centerpieces
• Missions project ideas

Try out these FREE coloring pages from the Church Family Harvest Celebration. There are two separate coloring pages in this file. Each coloring page has a memory verse. There is a coloring page in the file for the New International Version and a separate page for the King James Version. If you use a different Bible version than the ones given, feel free to cut off or white out the verse and replace it with the version you prefer.

You can make as many copies of these coloring pages as you need for your children's program. Click on either image below to download the harvest coloring pages. Visit our Sunday school downloads store for more coloring pages, crafts, and puzzle downloads—many as low as $3.99 each! We even have coloring pages and crafts designed especially for your VBS program. Visit our VBS downloads store  for more inexpensive downloads especially for vacation Bible school. May God bless you as you prepare to teach children (and their families) about the harvest season and how much God loves them.

Step by Step Memory Verse Learning

Psalm 37:23-24 — “The steps of a good man are ordered by the LORD: and he delighteth in his way. Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down: for the LORD upholdeth him with his hand.” (KJV) 

“If the LORD delights in a man’s way, he makes his steps firm; though he stumble, he will not fall, for the LORD upholds him with his hand.” (NIV) 

Give each of your students a sheet of construction paper and a marker. Help each child trace around his shoe with the marker and cut out the construction paper footprint. Help each child print one or two words of the memory verse on his footprint. Make sure each word of the verse is included on a footprint. If you have an extra footprint, include the reference, too. 

Have a student read the verse aloud from the Bible. Talk about the meaning of the verse. Then have the class repeat it several times. Take the footprints and mix them up. Have a volunteer put them in the right order. After he has, have the class say the verse. Mix up the footprints and have another volunteer do the same thing, followed by class recitation of the verse. Continue as long as interest continues.

SAVE on Classroom Decorations This Weekend Only!

Use Coupon Code WOW to save an extra 15% on bulletin board sets and classroom decorations this weekend only. You'll even save on those sets already marked down to 50% off. Simply type the code into the Coupon Code box when you check out or call us at 1-800-854-1531 first thing Monday and mention Coupon Code WOW (we open at 8:00 Pacific time). Some quantities are limited and may run out quickly. Bulletin boards are sold on a first come, first served basis.

Jesus, the True Vine: Bible Lesson

Here's a Bible lesson you can use with your students to help them understand that God takes care of us just as a gardener takes care of his garden and Christians grow spiritually when they read the Bible and stay connected to Jesus.

Bring a bowl of raisins, a bowl of grapes, and some napkins. Print out the visuals below and cut them apart. Put a circle of tape on the back of each one and give each visual to a different child. Hold your open Bible on your lap. Explain that this is a true story from the Bible.

JESUS, THE TRUE VINE

(Read John 15:1 and 5.) God says that He acts like a gardener. A gardener helps plants grow. God helps us live right and grow as Christians. In Bible times, many people grew grapes. A grape plant has several parts. First, there is the vine. (Have the child who has the Grape Vine place it on the wall.) Whose name is on the vine? (Jesus) The Bible calls Jesus the True Vine.

On the vine are many branches. (Have the children with the Side, Bottom, and Top Branches place them on the vine.) Good branches produce grapes. These grapes are called the fruit of the vine. (Pass around napkins and a bowl of grapes and let each child take a napkin and some grapes.)

God is the Gardener in the garden of life. Jesus is the Vine who grows good branches. Christians are those branches. If you have asked Jesus to be your Savior, you are like a branch on a vine in God’s garden.

What happens to a branch if it is cut off the vine? (It dies; it doesn’t grow anymore.) That’s what happens to anyone who isn’t a true follower of Jesus. The person may look like a Christian, and even act like one (by going to church and doing good things). But, if this person hasn’t invited Jesus into his life, he’s a fake Christian. He may fool other people, but he can’t fool God.

Branches need water and food to grow. How do the branches get these things? (through the roots) The vine sends food and water from the roots to the branches. Then the branches send food and water to the flowers that will produce grapes. (Pass around a bowl of raisins and let each child take some.)

Once the vine has been taken care of and well watered, it makes grapes. Some grapes are dried like these. We grow spiritually when we get food from the Bible (read the Bible and memorize what it says) and stay connected to Jesus. We don’t make grapes, but we do make good actions that remind people of the way Jesus acted. Our good actions are called spiritual fruit. Jesus gives a promise that helps us stay close to Him. (Read Matthew 28:20.)

This verse is part of the Great Commission, the last command Jesus gave before He went to heaven. Jesus promises to be with us always. Jesus will never leave us, just as a vine never leaves the branches.

(If you have children who are interested in becoming part of God's family and having Jesus as their Savior, talk with them individually after your lesson.)

Click on the image above for a larger view.

(This lesson is an excerpt from Elementary Bible Activity Lessons. Try a FREE sample and then choose your lesson by topic or Bible story. Each lesson is just $5.95 each and includes a teacher's lesson plus 4-6 student activity sheets. Copy as many as you need for your classes. Quantity discounts are available when you purchase ten or more lessons.)