Word association Write down as many words that spring to your mind when you think of these things : FALKIRK SCOTLAND THE X FACTOR.

Word association

• Write down as many words that spring to your mind when you think of these things:

FALKIRK

SCOTLAND

THE X FACTOR

• On a new page - make a spider diagram – write as many words that you can think of that are associated with the word ‘GOD’

God?

GOD

HeavenBeard

Throne

All Powerful

Prayers

Church

Up above us

Bible

Miracles

Old Man

Made the universe

Jesus

Devil Angels

Today we will:• look at what we

understand about God just now.

• Talk about how we imagined God when we were younger, and how we imagine God now.

• How people over the world and time have imagined God.

What does God look like?

Write down as many ‘images’ of God that you can think of. (2 minutes)

Looking for GodHow do different

people explain what God is like?

Watch the video and write down any description that you hear of what people think God is like.

In your jotter draw a picture of what you thought that God looked like when you were 5

God?

Picturing God

• Old man in the clouds?

• White clothes?• Crown?• Giant?• beard?• a throne?

Task: With your partner, write down why you think people always picture God with each of these descriptions. Why does he have white clothes? etc

Has anyone here seen God?

• Then how can we describe what he looks like?

• If an alien came to earth, and asked you to describe what God is, what would you tell them?

What is a god?

• Discuss with the person next to you...

• Creator?• Life giver• Protector• Powerful• Immortal• Pure• Wise

What is a symbol?

Ancient ideas and pictures of gods

• Thor, Isis, Re, Yahweh, Apollo, Diana, Zeus, Baal, Freyr....etc

If God had a name….

Watch the video clip and summarise what it wants people to think about.

TASK TWO

Choose two of the examples below and write what you think it really means.

He has kicked the bucket

Dan eats like a horse

John’s a right old pig

Pat is a pain in the neck

WORDS AS PICTURES

TASK ONE: COPY INTO JOTTER

Often people use words as pictures. They say things that shouldn’t be taken literally – instead they are trying to paint a picture to get a point across.

TASK THREE: COPY INTO JOTTER

God is really hard to understand, so people use symbolic language to

talk about God and to help us understand more about his

character, personality and nature.

Picturing God – Words as pictures

• Old man in the clouds?• A Man• White clothes?• Crown?• Giant?• beard?• a throne?

• What do these symbolise?

GOD

Match the symbols with their meanings

SYMBOLS MEANINGS

Man ruler of life

Up in the sky old and wise

White hair and beard pure and holy

White robe powerful

Crown and throne more important than anything else

Think…

• If someone said to you ‘Where is God?’

• What would your first reaction be?

Why do people point to the sky?

• Do they really believe that God is in the clouds?

How did people picture the world thousands of years ago?

Heaven

Earth

Hell

1

2

3

But really

God as magical rescuer?• Some people

treat God as though He were a rescuer.

• When they are in trouble, they shout out to God for help.

• For the rest of the time they ignore Him.

God as a policeman in the sky?

• God can also be seen as an all seeing policeman.

• It’s a matter of being good. If you’re not good, you will be punished!

God as an old man in the sky?

• Some people believe that ’He’s up there somewhere’.

• They believe that He must be old as He has been around since the beginning of time.

• This poses a couple of questions:

• Is God a person? • How can that be?• Why do we think of

God as a person, and more specifically as a ‘He’?

God as a powerful force?

• Because you cannot see God, some people believe that it is a force.

• They describe this force as a wind.

• You only know that God exists by the effect that God has – like the wind on waves of the sea.

My Parents

• Read the poem through and try the 6 questions

TASK

• Read pg 5-12 in the Looking for God comic book.