This is lesson 25 of 33 in a series of lessons called “Praise God Through the Psalms.”
“Praise God Through the Psalms” – Psalm 90
Lesson focus: Through the book of Psalms and the worship of the people of Israel, we get a glimpse into the character of God and how we should rightly respond to Him in worship. In Psalm 90, the psalmist reminds us that God is eternal and man is mortal and encourages the readers to spend their lives for God and remember that He is sovereign in all things.
Passage: Psalm 90
Target Audience: Kindergarten-4th Grade (can be adapted for older or younger children)
Teaching Time: 45 minutes – 1 hour
Materials Needed: Bibles, blank paper, markers, a large sheet of paper
Optional Materials: if you want to be able to send the kids home with something each week, you can print the text of the Psalm on one side of a piece of paper and on the back print “I should praise God because He is ____________” (leave the rest of the page blank for drawing.
Optional: Read more Bible verses about time
Early Arriver/ Opening 10 minutes– have a few board games out and play with kids as they arrive. Don’t underestimate the conversations that happen while playing “Jenga” or “Uno” with a group of kids.
Intro– – Stat out by talking about human limitations. Have a few simple challenges to see who can last the longest….who can do the most jumping jacks (star jumps) without getting tired, who can do the most sit ups, etc. Ask kids about their bed time and how long they sleep at night. Help them to see that we all get tired, we all need rest, we all have physical limitations.
Read the Text. . .Psalm 90 ….
- Have each kid in the group read one verse, or have 3 volunteers do the reading (divided amongst them). As you go through the Psalm continually ask kids (1) what is this Psalm telling us about who God is?, (2) what is this Psalm telling us about what God does and (3) what is this Psalm telling us about what God expects of His people and how His people should respond to Him.
- As you go through the Psalm, have a signal for the kids in the group to make (like a time-out signal- – a T with your hands) every time they hear another truth about who God is and/ what God is like/ or what God has done. Each time you take a time-out, briefly talk about that characteristic of God.
- Take a few minutes to talk about what truths this Psalm teaches us about God. Remind kids of the opening activity and how we saw that we have limits, but that this Psalm reminds us that God is eternal and has no limits. Talk about the ways that the Psalm talks about this truth…
(1) vs 1- through all generations,
(2) vs 2- before the mountains were born, everlasting to everlasting,
(3) vs 4- a thousand years is like a day.
After establishing the fact that God is eternal (He has no beginning or ending), ask the kids to tell you how this Psalm talks about people….
(1) vs 9- our days pass away,
(2)vs 10- we live 70-80 years, our lives fly away.
Help kids to see the difference between God’s eternal character and our limited life.
Then, take a few minutes to talk about what Moses prays the people will do with the limited time that each of us have… (1) vs 12- number our days right, keep the right focus on God and (2) vs 14- sing for joy and be glad.
- Cross- Connection– – Reread vs 7-9. Ask kids why God is angry at people. Talk about sin and how from the very beginning (Genesis 3) people have been rebelling against God, disobeying Him and choosing to live in sin. Point out how vs 8 says that even our secret sins are known by God. Help kids to see that according to the Bible we are all sinners (Romans 3:10-12 & 23) and that even if we look like perfect angels on the outside that God knows our hearts and knows even our secret sins. Remind the group of God’s holiness in contrast to our sinfulness and how we deserve the anger of God, but (Romans 5:8) in His great mercy God sent Jesus to take the anger that we deserve and die in our place.
Worship Time– After discussing the passage, distribute the paper and markers or pages printed with the text for the week. Explain that each week you want them to do three things in response to the Psalm…
- write a verse from the passage that they want to remember
- write a reason to praise God that they see in the Psalm
- draw of something from the passage that they think is important.
Give kids time to work on their pages and then have them share what they have drawn or written with the rest of the group.
Prayer– – Close in prayer by praying for the kids in the group that they would come to see how much God loves His people and would respond to the love of God by turning from their sin and turning to God in repentance.
Extra Time – – If you have any extra time at the end, play the name game again, or play OT/NT– – Have all the kids stand up in the middle of the room. Call out a book of the Bible. If it’s in the OT they have to go to your left side and if it’s NT they have to go to your right side. To make it even more challenging, you could call out names that aren’t books of the Bible and have them freeze for those…… OR Bible book 4 corners- – choose 4 Bible books in order (matthew, mark, luke & John). Choose one corner to represent each of the books and tell the kids. First round, call out one of the books and kids race to the right corner, last one there is out. Play til 1 kid is left. For the 2nd round, call out one of the book names and the race to the corner for the next book…ie: you say Matthew and they race to the “mark” corner.