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10 Commandments: No idols
Read: Exodus 20:4-6; 2 Kings 23:1-20
In This Passage: After finding and reading God’s law, King Josiah starts taking the worship of the one real God seriously. He goes from place to place in Israel burning and smashing idols and altars. By the time he’s finished, any evidence of worshipping fake gods is gone!
Bible Point: There’s only one real God.
Summary Verse: “Jesus replied, ‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind’ ” (Matthew 22:37).
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We’re going to see how a king in the Bible got rid of a bunch of things called idols. Idols were fake gods people worshipped instead of the one real God. Let’s find out more in the Bible, God’s special book. God gave us the Bible so we can get to know him, the one real God.
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Craft:
Supplies
“Idol Destroyer” handout, printed on card stock (1 per child) (download here)
scissors
tape
drinking straws (1 per child)
markers
In our Bible story, King Josiah destroyed the idols and altars! This little idol-destroying king can remind us how Josiah knocked down and destroyed every idol and altar he could find.
Give each child a handout. Set out the remaining supplies to share, and have kids follow these directions to make idol destroyers.
Fold along the dotted lines on your handout, folding in or out depending on the directions.
Cut out the template on your handout, including cutting between the body and arms.
Add a face, clothes, and the crown using markers.
Flip your idol destroyer over and tape one end of a straw to the back of its head.
Tape the back piece from your handout to the idol destroyer’s back, over the straw. Tape only the sides so that the straw can still move up and down.
Move the Arms
Show kids how to move the idol destroyer’s arms by holding on to the bottom corner of the torso and moving the straw up and down.
Let kids try reenacting the story with their idol destroyers, swinging the arms to knock down “idols.”
Talk About It
- Why did it matter that Josiah destroyed the idols and altars instead of just having people stop worshipping fake gods?
- What are some fake gods you’ve believed in or fake things you’ve believed about God? For example, before today kids may have believed there are many gods that could be real to different people or that God doesn’t really know everything.
- What will it take for you to remove worship of those fake gods from your life?
Josiah knew there’s only one real God. He wanted to destroy anything that was set up to worship a fake god! There are a lot of things our culture will tell you about what to believe, but you can knock any of those lies down with the truth that there’s only one real God.
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Pray:
God, thank you that you are the only real God. Help us love and follow you and never accept a lie that another god is real. In Jesus’ name, amen.
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Activity Sheet:
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Bible Study:
We’re learning about God’s Commandments, the big commandments he gave Moses to share with all his people. Here is this week’s commandment.
Read Exodus 20:4.
If you logged in last week, that might sound like it’s repeating the first one, “Don’t have any other god besides God.” But here’s the difference: God knew we’d want a god we could see and touch.
He knew people would be tempted to worship things they made or even God’s creation rather than God himself. He knew people would start other religions that centered around these fake gods. But there’s only one real God, and making up gods we can see and touch doesn’t make them real.
In those days, the men and women who lived near God’s people made statues and poles that they worshipped as gods. God didn’t want his people to do any of that, but God’s people didn’t follow his commandment very well. Eventually Judah, where God’s people lived, was full of idols!
Then a king named Josiah came along. He heard some Bible verses…maybe even the one we just read! So he decided to get rid of the idols. Let’s see what he did.
Read 2 Kings 23:12.
Create a tower from blocks or lego.
Imagine these creations are altars. Let’s smash them! Have kids bust down the tower.
Josiah smashed the altars and idols because there’s only one real God. He also burned other items of worship. Check this out.
Read 2 Kings 23:15.
Josiah ground a shrine to dust because there’s only one real God. There’s a lot more detail to our story than we’ll get into, but the Bible lists all the different places Josiah found idols and altars. He was very thorough, and he destroyed every single one! Josiah knew there’s only one real God, and he didn’t want to leave any trace of fake gods.
Read 2 Kings 23:19.
There’s only one real God, and we worship him.
Talk About It
- Why do you think it was so important for Josiah to get rid of every single idol?
- Tell about a statue or pole you’ve seen. Have you ever seen anyone bowing to it?
In Josiah’s day, other gods were statues and idols. Maybe this story doesn’t really connect with you because where we live, most people don’t worship statues and poles. But people do worship other gods.
- Tell what you know about other religions.
A lot of people today believe there are many ways to heaven. They might think Jesus is one way but also believe you could get to heaven by worshipping any number of other gods. Or they think “whatever you want to believe is true is true for you.” Or that you can just try to be a good person. Or that the “universe” decides what happens to you. But none of that is true. The truth is there’s only one real God. We may not see people bowing to statues today, but we see a lot of people who spread ideas that there’s more than one real God. So let’s think about what is true about our one real God.
Our real God is with you all the time, even though you can’t see him. Our real God is your friend! Our real God died for you and came back to life. No other religion has a god who came to earth and died so that you could be his friend. God is real and big, but he’s also personal and he loves you. That’s what’s awesome about our one real God. No fake god could offer you that kind of love.
God knew we’d love to be able to see him when we worship him, but we don’t need “stuff” to represent God in order to worship him. There’s only one real God, and only he deserves our worship.
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