Week of Sunday, August 2, 2026
Creation — Genesis 1:26-31
God created us for a reason
The Big Idea
God made everything out of nothing — light first, then sky and sea and land, then every animal there is. People came last, and he made them differently: in his own image, like him. Nothing else in the story gets that.
Then he looked at all of it, called it very good, and rested. Ask your child what they think God made last. Most grown-ups guess wrong too.
Memory Verse
"So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them."
The week's four words are "in his own image." Everything else in the story is setup for them.
Conversation Starters
For the dinner table or the car line this week.
- What is something you are good at that nobody here knows about?
- God rested on the seventh day. When do you rest?
- If God made you on purpose, what do you think the purpose is?
Family Activity · 15 min
The Six Days
Six pieces of paper, one per day. Everybody draws whatever they remember God making on that day — nobody looks anything up, and nobody corrects anybody. Lay them in order on the floor. Then add a seventh, blank, and leave it blank. That one is the rest.
Pray Together
God, thank you that we were not an accident.
What We Did Sunday
We learned that God created us for a reason. God made everything out of nothing, and the last thing he made was people — in his own image. Then he looked at all of it and called it very good, and rested.
What they learned Sunday
God saved people for last, and made them like himself
God made everything out of nothing — light first, then sky and sea and land, then every animal there is. The last thing he made was people, and he made them differently: in his own image, like him. Nothing else got that. Then he looked at all of it and called it very good, and rested.
- What is something you are good at that nobody here knows about?
- God rested on the seventh day. When do you rest?
- If God made you on purpose, what do you think the purpose is?
Chaplain America
Nothing. Then everything. In under a week.
Sunday night
Genesis 1:26-31
Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” And God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.
Around the table
This Sunday: the beginning. Not the animals-two-by-two beginning — the actual first one, where there is nothing at all and then there is a universe.
What is the biggest thing you have ever made from scratch?
God's first recorded words are three of them: let there be light. He did not build the light. He said it, and it was there.
If you could say one thing and have it happen, what would you say?
Tomorrow at 9:30. Fellowship Hall.
One line before bed: God, thank you that we were not an accident.
Today at 9:30. Fellowship Hall. They meet the beginning this morning — ask them afterward what God made last.
What is something you are good at that nobody here knows about?
God did not speak people into being the way he spoke the light. He knelt down and used dirt. The maker of galaxies got his hands in the ground for this one.
What is something you would only do slowly and carefully, because it mattered?
"Fearfully and wonderfully made" is not a compliment about how you look. It is a claim about how much care went in.
What is one thing about how you are made that you are glad about?
Tonight, 6:30. They are going deeper on this question: if God already knew what he was making, why bother making us at all?
Ask them on the way home whether they figured it out. Then tell them what you think — this one is worth your actual answer.
This week's mission
The Quiet Good Thing
Do one thing you are good at this week, for somebody else, without telling them it was you. Draw it, fix it, carry it, explain it — whatever your thing is. Then do not mention it. Not once. Not even a hint. You will want to, and that wanting is the whole mission.