Hamburger Series: I am the BREAD of LIFE

Scripture: for teacher background:  John 6:32-58

(Bread part of hamburger)

Making contact:

You could give the children a slice of bread to eat and talk about different kinds of bread,

Or

Ask the children what they like to put on a hamburger.

Or

Play a game about a hamburger. You start and say: “I am so hungry I could eat a hamburger”.

The first child says: “I am so hungry I could eat a hamburger with tomato sauce.” 

The next child repeats the whole thing and adds something else e.g. a slice of pineapple, lettuce, tomato, chips, etc.

Explain again that just as the game built a huge hamburger, today we are going to begin our “I AM” burger, beginning with the bread or roll.

 Exploration:

The first “I AM” we are going to learn about is when Jesus said: “I am the bread of life.”

Bread is a very important basic food for us. I am sure we all have bread every day.

Bread gives us strength and energy.

When we pray the Lord’s Prayer, we say: “Give us this day our daily bread.” 

We are praying that God will provide for our daily needs. We didn’t say cake or sweets – not luxuries, we aren’t greedy, we prayed for bread – the basics.

Now when Jesus was teaching all the people and they had been following Him around for a couple of days, they were very hungry. 

Do you remember what special thing happened? 

Do you remember about the little boy who gave his lunch to Jesus?  

Jesus first said grace and then He broke up 6 little loaves of bread and the 2 fish and 5 000 men got food, plus all the woman and children. 

The disciples collected 12 baskets of leftovers after the meal. Jesus did this again on the other side of the lake for 4 000 people.

It was after this that the people demanded another miracle. They asked Him to always give them bread. 

Jesus then said these famous words: “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in Me will never be thirsty.”

Application

 It was at the last supper that Jesus took bread and broke it and gave it to His disciples and told them to eat it in REMEMBRANCE of Him, because just like He broke the bread, His body would be broken. 

He then took the cup and gave thanks and told them to drink from it to remember how His blood was shed for us. 

Every time we have communion, we are remembering how much Jesus did for us and we are eating the bread in faith. It strengthens us, and we believe as we eat it that Jesus is the Bread of life!

We do need to eat real bread each day, and we do get hungry again, but Jesus feeds our hearts and souls, giving us peace and joy. 

When we ask Jesus to live in our hearts we never have that soul hunger again.

That’s why people get into alcohol and drugs and wrong sex, they are looking for something to fill their empty souls. 

But Jesus must fill that gap in our hearts. Nothing else will satisfy for long –Only He is the Bread of Life.

Challenge to Mission

Starving people can’t just be told that Jesus is the Bread of life. Let’s first help them by giving them something to eat and then help them to get work so that they can buy their own bread, with dignity but MOST important of all we must tell them about Jesus. 

God blesses us that we bless others. Jesus first fed the people with actual bread and then He told them that He was the bread of life.

 Consolidation

On the worksheet, the children need to fill in BREAD. (Give us our daily……..) There is a reminder to say  ‘Thank you for food.”

Memory Verse

Jesus said to them: “I AM THE BREAD OF LIFE. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in Me will never be thirsty.” John 6:35

This is printed on a picture of half a bread roll on the worksheet.

Tell the children to practice this verse all week and next week they will get a little picture of a hamburger to keep if they can say the verse. See sheet of small hamburger pictures.