29 September 2013 The Story of Hannah Preschool Sunday School

1 Samuel Ch. 1-2 KJV And she was in bitterness of soul and prayed unto the Lord and wept sore. And she vowed a vow, and said, O Lord of hosts, if thou wilt indeed look upon thy infliction of thine handmaid, and remember me, and not forget thine handmaid, but wilt give unto thine handmaid a man child, then I will give him unto the Lord all the days of his life, and there shall no razor come upon his head. (1:11) Now Hannah, she spake in her heart; only her lips moved, but her voice was not heard (1:13). I am a woman of sorrowful spirit I have poured out my soul before the Lord. Introduction Have you ever wanted something really bad? What did you want?

One time some of my friends broke my favorite baby doll that I had gotten for my birthday. I was so sad and one night I prayed with my mom for a new baby doll. Guess what happened? My dad took me to the store one night and he told me to pick out any baby doll that I wanted so I wouldnt be sad anymore! I found the one baby that I really had wanted in all the magazines, but they didnt have any more girl baby dolls. My dad kept looking for it anyway and found the very last one and it was a boy and he bought it for me. He even built me a doll cradle out of wood for this very special baby doll. My mom read me the story about Hannah and Samuel that day so I decided to name my baby doll Samuel like in the story! And guess what? I still have that same baby doll at my parents house! He is very very old! Are you all ready to hear our story today? Read the story of Hannah out of the childrens Bible. If the children would like, they can play with play dough while they listen. Why was Hannah weeping when she should have been happy? She was unable to have a child and she was teased about it. What did Hannah pray for? She prayed for a son and said she would give him to the Lord. How did Hannah pray? She poured out her heart and soul to God. She told Him exactly how she felt.

What made Hannah stand out in this story? She continued to praise God even when she was sad and she had great faith that he would hear her prayers. 1 Samuel 2:1 And Hannah prayed, and said, My heart rejoiceth in the Lord She thanked God for answering her prayers and she kept her promise to him by giving Samuel to the Lord. Samuels name means God has heard. Activity 1. Pass out the worksheets. Notice each of you has a picture of a person. Lets look at this together and see if we can name the different parts of the body. Eyes, ears, mouth, heart, hands, and feet! Lets color the picture. In this Bible story Hannah prays with her heart and soul. Have any of you ever prayed for something before? What did you pray for? Let them all take turns answering. Did you use your mouth to say your prayer or were you quiet? Did you fold your hands or close your eyes? How do you pray? Hannah also used her hands and feet to go to back and forth to the city to worship God and she used her ears to listen to Him. Activity 2. When God answered Hannahs prayer she was very happy! She even thanked God and continued to worship Him. Now we are going to sing and play music. Who wants to pick the songs? Who will pass out the instruments? Activity 3. Are you ready to have some more fun? Someone very special last week asked me if we could paint today and guess what? We are going to paint! We are going to paint with bubbles!!! Isnt that so cool? Put soap and water into a bow and add some food coloring. Have someone pass out the straws and paper hearts. We are going to see something really fun! I need your help to blow some bubbles! Do you think you can do that? Let the children use the straws to blow bubbles for a little bit and then have them stop. Look at how the bubbles keep getting bigger and bigger! Thats like when we say a prayer! When we pray our prayers go up to heaven and God hears them. God keeps our prayers in his heart. Have them blow the bubbles onto the heart cut-outs. When the bubbles pop they leave colorful designs on the hearts. God remembers our prayers and promises to answer all of them. Isnt that wonderful? We are going to let these hearts dry now and we will keep them to remember that we can always talk to God at any time and He hears us. Hannah knew that God would hear her even though she could not see Him. That is called faith. She was very special because even though she was sad she still chose to follow God and be thankful. That is kind of hard to do sometimes. Now lets say a prayer and then we can play with the toys until our families come.

(Activity idea taken from abcjesuslovesme.com)