Take students to an open place and play a game of “Marco Polo.” Of course, you’ll have to be creative with the rules, since you won’t be in a pool! Let your imagination run wild with “dry” equivalents of “Fish Out Of Water!” etc.

 

Talk to the kids about how God pursues us, just like the individual who is “it” in the game of Marco Polo. God’s love for us is the motivating factor that keeps Him loving and pursuing us regardless of how far or fast we run, or of how bad we mess up.

 

Play the song for the students and then ask them to draw the connection of Marco Polo, God pursuing us, and the lyrics of GAWVI’s song. You may want to hand out copies of the lyrics for students to follow along.

 

Read Psalm 139:1-10 and then Romans 8:38-39.

 

When I think about love I am challenged with how some people recklessly approach it by making it conditional. This is why so many relationships break apart. Loving unconditionally is hard for us to do. However for God, loving unconditionally is who He is. When God created humankind in the beginning in Genesis, He made man in His own image. Out of love God gave mankind many of the attributes of Himself.

 

When sin entered the world, the relationship between God and man was broken. God was prepared for this and already had a plan in motion to pursue us with His love to heal the broken relationship. How do we know that God pursues us? Psalm 139:1-10 basically says that He is everywhere and we cannot escape Him even when we think we can. He could have easily walked away from us, but He didn’t.

 

Romans 8:38-39 tells us that nothing can separate us from God’s love. When we feel broken, abandoned, or we just want to run from God, we need to just stop and understand that He won’t walk away from us but loves us and wants to re-establish that broken relationship. No love will ever match up to that of God’s love for us. That alone should be what draws us closer to Him.

 

Discussion Questions:

No love will ever match up to that of God’s love for us. That alone should be what draws us closer to Him. God’s love is so indescribable. His heart for us is unrelenting and He wants to be reconnected with us. We have to stop running from Him and start running to Him. We haven’t done anything to deserve God’s love. We can’t do anything to earn God’s love. However, He still chooses to love us and wants us to love Him back.