Fruitful - Day Two Bible Lesson - Self-control

Teen/Adult Bible Lesson

PDF version of this lesson: Fruitful 022 Bible Day Two Older.pdf

If we have God’s Spirit in us, God helps us control ourselves. Jesus taught us a prayer to help us ask God for help with self-control, temptation, and forgiving others.

The Lord’s Prayer
Matthew 6:9-13 (ESV)

(Jesus said,) “Pray then like this:
‘Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
For yours is the kingdom and the power
and the glory, forever. Amen’”

The Lord’s Prayer
Matthew 6:9-13 (ERV)

(Jesus said,) “So this is how you should pray:
‘Our Father in heaven,
we pray that your name will always be kept holy.
We pray that your kingdom will come—
that what you want will be done here on earth,
the same as in heaven.
Give us the food we need for today.
Forgive our sins,
just as we have forgiven those who did wrong to us.
Don’t let us be tempted,
but save us from the Evil One,
For the kingdom and the power
and the glory belong to you
forever and ever. Amen.'”

Which of these things do you think are more easy, and which do you think are more difficult? Which one is the most difficult for you?

• Getting along with people in my family
• Getting along with my friends
• Getting to know new people
• Forgiving people who disappoint me
• Forgiving people who hurt me
• Loving people I know
• Loving people I don’t know
• Keeping my temper when people make me angry
• Deciding not to argue when someone tries to start an argument

Most of these require some level of self-control.

What does self-control mean to you?

Most people would say it means being able to manage your reactions to things happening around you. That’s definitely true.

Do you also think it can mean managing what’s going on inside of you? In your thoughts and feelings?

Do you find it more difficult to manage the inside things than the outer things? Sometimes we can be very upset on the inside, but control ourselves so that others can’t tell what we are thinking or how we are really feeling.

How often do you pray? Every day? Only when you are at church? When you are worried about a situation? When you need to ask God for something? When someone is sick?

There are all kinds of reasons people pray. Some people pray every day when they wake up, to thank God for another day of life. People pray when someone they love is sick or hurt, because they know that God can help. Many people pray just to praise God for who He is and all of the great things He has done.

There are so many different ways to pray!

Just like you need to communicate with someone if you expect to have a healthy relationship with them, God wants to be a part of our daily life. He loves us and wants us to talk to him all the time—not just when we are worried or have a big request for Him.

One day, Jesus taught His followers a prayer that they could use when they talked to God each day. He didn’t say that these are the only words we should use when we talk to God, but they give us an example of a really good prayer that is really several different kinds of prayer rolled into one.

We read it at the beginning of class. Let’s take a look at what each part means…

Our Father in heaven…

This part reminds us that God is a good Father who loves us. We’ll learn more about that tomorrow!

hallowed be your name.

‘Hallowed’ is an old-fashioned word for ‘holy’. In this part of the prayer, we are telling God that we wish everyone on earth would honor His name and know that He is holy.

Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

In this part we are praising God and telling Him that we wish everyone on earth would praise Him and honor Him and follow Him, like everyone does in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread,

This is a small part of the prayer, but it is one of the most important parts! It reminds us that we need to talk to God daily! It teaches us that we don’t need to worry about the future. Only God knows what will happen in the future, and He’s got everything under control. We should trust God to provide what we need for today.

and forgive us our debts (or sins, or trespasses) as we also have forgiven our debtors (or those who have sinned against us, or those who have harmed us).

Did you notice that we’re asking God to forgive us exactly like we forgive others? Most of the time, we are not very good at forgiving others. We get upset when people do or say bad things to us, and we stay mad at them instead of forgiving them. People tend to be pretty terrible at forgiveness! That’s where the Holy Spirit can help us with today’s Fruit: Self-control. When we are not able to calm down and forgive someone, the Holy Spirit helps us do that. Without the Holy Spirit, we are terrible at forgiveness (and a lot of other things), but if the Spirit of God is working in us, we will find that we are able to forgive like Jesus.

And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

In this part of the prayer, we are asking God to guide our steps every day. We are admitting that when we try to make our own way, we often get into trouble with temptation and sin—but when we follow the Spirit’s guidance, we will get into a lot less trouble. This is part of self-control too! We are telling God that we don’t want to handle self-control on our own—because that leads to a lot of mistakes—but that we want our self-control to come from the Holy Spirit.

Do you ever have trouble controlling yourself?

Do you ever get angry and say or do things that you wish you hadn’t?

If someone is mean or bad towards you, do you lose your temper and treat them badly in return?

Have you ever tried to have better self-control on your own? Did it work? Did it work for a little while and then go back to how it was?

Why do you think it’s so difficult to develop self-control in ourselves when it’s easy for us to see the problems other people have and give them advice on how to solve them?

Try asking God to help you with self-control. He sent the Holy Spirit to help us bear fruit that will make our lives better and allow us to serve Him better. One of those ‘fruits’ is self-control. God promises He can help us with that, so we should remember to let the Holy Spirit do that!

When you meet others who have great self-control, ask them how they achieved it. It’s very likely that you will hear about how they let the Spirit of God work in their lives, and the self-control came to them as a fruit of the Spirit.

What Fruit of the Spirit have we learned about so far this week?

Kindness, Gentleness, Self-control

Let’s review today’s Truth:

Self-control is difficult. If we have God’s Spirit in us, God helps us control ourselves. Jesus taught us a prayer to help us ask God for help with self-control, temptation, and forgiving others.

Let’s say/pray The Lord’s Prayer together:

Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.

Prayer

With today’s focus on prayer, this would be a great day to ask your students if there is anything in their lives that you can pray for—not just during Camp but even after you are back home. Make sure that they understand that any prayer requests they share with you will not be shared with others, but will be used in your personal prayer time only. One way to do this is to pass out index cards and ask them to write down things that they would like you to pray for. Collect them from students who have requests and promise to keep those things in your prayers. Make the activity optional, as some students may not have anything they feel they want to request prayer for, and that’s okay.

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