Prepare Him Room: Celebrating the Birth of Jesus Family Devotional

Great study but not for under 7 years.

With perfect timing for the upcoming Advent season, there comes this book by Marty Machowski. Prepare Him Room Celebrating the Birth of Jesus. This book is a family devotional aimed at directing our hearts and leading our families toward the wonderful celebration of the birth of Christ. In a culture where Christmas trees are on sale before turkeys, it is too easy to loose track of the heart of this great holiday. Santa is looked for on Christmas eve but He who came and is coming is ignored or left to only an illuminated depiction of the manger scene somewhere in the corner of our lawns. There are many who have written books to turn our minds back to this Child King but I have found one which stands out among the rest. Machowski writes with this aim in mind and moves forward to the consummation of the Messiah's arrival, and ends in the glory of the Risen King. Christmas is the celebration of the birth of Jesus but as this author reminds us there is more to the story than wise men and shepherds and the virgin birth. This babe in a manger grows up to teach others and to heal the sick, Jesus feeds thousands with little more than a boys sack lunch and he even raises Lazarus from the dead. Never raising far above his humble birth Jesus lives with very little and "finds no place to lay his head" He stands up against the rulers of His day and insites a plot to kill him. Jesus is betrayed by one of his own disciples and abandoned by the rest. Being led to the authorities Jesus is beaten and scourged for His teachings and despised by all. The people He lived among and poured out His love to have now demanded His crucifixion. This child of Mary who was praised by the angels at his birth is now led to the cross where He gives up His life and dies for our sins. Three days in the grave and death cannot hold him, He rises in power and his resurrection is seen my many. Before ascending to the Father our risen savior commissions his church to proclaim his resurrection to all the earth and await a new day when He comes not as a humble child but as the glorious King. Prepare Him Room is designed to be a four week devotional for the Advent season. Each week has three lessons which can be used throughout the week and there is included a chapter from the fictional short story of the Bartimaeus Orphanage about the joy of our adoption in Christ. The direction of the lessons each week are meant to lead up from the ancient prophecies of the Old Testament telling of the coming child to the days of Jesus's birth. The climax of the lessons leads the reader from the manger to the cross and from the cross to the glory of the Risen King. The final lesson is finished on Christmas day with the reading of Luke 2:1-20. Each lesson includes activities for the kids that bring attention to the lesson and there is a selection of scripture to be read with a short commentary by the author. After the lesson there is a "think about it" section where Machowski has questions for the family that can be used to bring about discussion for reflexion of the text. Every lesson includes a prompt to prayer and Christmas hymns to be sung. Overall the lessons and activities should take less than an hour and are great for younger age groups up to teenagers. I think this book could be used for older ages but I would hope the leader would include further and deeper discussion during their teaching. The activities included in this book are fun and great ways to help bring focus on the lessons for the day. My favorite example is towards the end of the book. The text is Revelations 7:9-12 where John witnesses the countless multitude around the throne of God praising the Lamb who was slain. The kids are asked to watch as you sprinkle a small pinch of sand on a sheet of white paper and then they are to try and count the number of grains on the paper. Amazing how much sand is in one little pinch and the author points us to the promise of God to Abraham that his offspring would be as numerous as the sand on the seashore. (Genesis 32:12) These activities are sure to be a great time together with your family and hopefully a wonderful opportunity to teach your little ones about Jesus Christ. Machowski's use of the traditional Christmas texts is fresh and insightful all the while being honest to the wholeness of Scripture and always directing us to the truth about Christ. There must be a word here about the fictional story read each week and finished just before the last lesson. The story is tittled "Bartimaeus: A Christmas Story" I don't want to give anything away but the story is about an orphanage house in New York during the time of the civil war. This story teaches the joy of being adopted in Christ. My wife read aloud each chapter as we reviewed this book together, tears welled up in both our eyes both for sadness and for joy. The reading is well done and both parents and the kids will enjoy it. This is not some silly addition meant to entertain young minds which tend to yawn at devotions but rather through the telling of this story there is a lesson of great joy and truth to be learned This tale leads our hearts to the love of the Savior and brings glory to God. If you are looking for a great resource to lead your family in a thought provoking and God honoring teaching this advent season I encourage you to pick up a copy of Marty Machowski's book Prepare Him Room.

God has blessed His church with many people, not least of whom is Marty Machowski. Marty has written several books to help families and churches teach their children well. Now, Machowski offers, 'Prepare Him Room–Celebrating the Birth of Jesus Family Devotional'. Families of younger children (age 11 and under) will benefit greatly from this book.Prepare Him Room provides three sections for each of the four weeks of Advent. So, for example, if your family started usingPrepare Him Room on Sunday, November 30, you would do three sections that first week and so on. Then, there's a final reading for Christmas Day. Plus, Marty adds a new story called 'Bartimaeus' that will help bring it all together for all listeners. There are activities, songs, even recipes (in some of the sections) that will help make memories as well as help young participants treasure up the incarnation within their hearts. Families of slightly older children can still benefit. I would recommend having the older kids read the chapters to their siblings or be in charge of songs or baking. Grandparents: you, too, can be actively involved by purchasing these for your grandchildren, either as gifts or for you to use (if you live nearby). One of the things Machowski does so well in his books is tie the Old Testament and New Testament together. Drawing from Old Testament prophecies and showing their fulfillment in the New, the author helps all to see that God's Word is a whole; that the story of redemption is the singular theme. If your church is looking for ways to help Advent remain alive, not becoming stale in the same old, same old routine, then order the curriculum version of Prepare Him Room. There are class ideas along with a teaching CD which will prove helpful. One of the challenges each year, on these major church holidays, is taking a story that is so familiar it's almost become mundane. How sad, that the incarnation of our Lord should be reduced to that. Allow Marty Machowski to help breathe fresh air into this account and have families invigorated for this Advent season. As a father, grandfather and a pastor, I highly commend this book to you.

If my wife didn't forbid it, I would play Christmas music all year. I would give (and gladly receive) presents every day. I would sing "Hark! the Herald Angels Sing!" every Sunday. I love Christmastime. So I was delighted to hear of Marty Machowski's new Advent devotional and classroom curriculum: Prepare Him Room. By using these resources in the 4 weeks leading up to Christmas, families and churches will lead their children through a study of Old Testament promises, Jesus' birth narratives, and New Testament explanations of Christ's person and work. This material ties the entire Bible together in a sound and simple-to-use package. I highly recommend it. How It Works If you're not familiar with Machowski's other works for children (The Gospel Story for Kids series), an explanation is in order. If you are familiar, and you'd like to get to the meat of my recommendation, you may want to scroll to the next section. With The Gospel Story for Kids (TGSFK), Machowski developed material for use in both churches and homes. The idea is that church children's ministries ought to support what parents do at home (duh!), and so the curriculum all fits together. The pieces are: - The Gospel Story Bible - a Bible storybook for young children - The Gospel Story Curriculum - lesson plans for Sunday Schools, grouped in 3 age classifications: preschool, lower elementary, upper elementary - Long Story Short - 10-minute family devotionals through the Old Testament - Old Story New - 10-minute family devotionals through the New Testament You can use any part of the package independently of the others (for example, if your church doesn't want the curriculum, but you want to use the family devotionals at home). But if you use them all together, they take your children through the entire Bible in 3 years (a year and a half for each testament), and your children will experience the walk through three times (once at each age level: preschool, lower elementary, and upper elementary). All children and families are studying the same Bible passage each week, in an age-appropriate fashion. Prepare Him Room works just like the rest of TGSFK series, except that it's designed just for Advent season. There is a family devotional book, and a CD with lesson plans for classrooms. For those using TGSFK materials, Prepare Him Room will give you a 4-week break to focus on the birth of Christ. Why I Like It My church has used TGSFK for over a year now, and we love it. We use the curriculum for ages 3-11, and a church member donated money to give every family with copies of the Bible storybook and family devotionals. We had a special meeting with everyone to kick it off, and I'm scheduled to lead a seminar this Sunday to refresh those who need encouragement to press on in family devotions. It has not proven to be a magical ambrosia guaranteeing eternal life to all who partake; we still have to train teachers, equip parents, and shepherd children's messy hearts. Christian discipleship is a heavy business that resists oversimplification and systematization. But these tools have made our job simple and delightful, and here's why: - Machowski focuses on reading the Bible. His materials supplement the Scriptures but do not replace them. Even in the children's Bible storybook, much space is spent quoting the text of Scripture. The upper elementary curriculum trains students to read and study the Scripture for themselves. Hurrah! - Every class lesson explicitly connects the Bible passage to the gospel. No child can escape the weekly mantra: "The gospel is the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ for our salvation." The most eye-catching part of each lesson plan is the little box explaining how that week's text preaches the gospel. - When every child and family reads the same passages each week, it grows our identity as a community. We have shared material to discuss informally. And every time a teacher reads from the story Bible or devotional, at least one child is guaranteed to shout, "We have that book at home, too!" - The family devotions are short. When the subtitle says Ten Minute Devotions to Draw Your Family to God, it speaks truth. We've been able to work ours in at dinner time, and it rarely feels like a burden. There are devotions for 5 days per week, but when we're feeling overwhelmed with our family schedule we can drop the 5th one without losing too much continuity. It hardly takes any time, but without sacrificing depth. - The lesson plans are easily adaptable. They give suggestions in 5-10 minute chunks to cover a class up to 80 minutes long. Our church schedule allows for only 40 minutes of class time, but it's not hard for teachers to figure out which chunks to drop to fit within our constraints. - The lessons require little preparation. Of course, the best teachers (not me) spend oodles of time and have terrific lessons. I teach, not because I live to teach children, but because I want to serve. And this curriculum doesn't cost me too much. I can gather my props in 5 minutes and spend the bulk of my preparation in study and prayer. I'm not chasing down construction paper, wiping off bottles of glue, or picking glitter out of my hair. Perhaps I'm showing too much of my hand, though, and other teachers may prefer supply scavenger hunts. A Few Qualifications Though this review is about Prepare Him Room, the Advent devotional and curriculum, I couldn't review it without reference to the rest of The Gospel Story For Kids series. If you like TGSFK, you'll love Prepare Him Room. If you're unfamiliar with TGSFK, Prepare Him Room may be a painless introduction to the model. As with the rest of TGSFK, you can buy Prepare Him Room as either a set of family devotionals or a classroom curriculum. There are just a few differences with Prepare Him Room, when compared to TGSFK: - The family book includes devotionals for just 3 days per week. - The family book also includes a 4-chapter story, one chapter per week, to serve as a fourth family time. The story is okay but not great, and I wish there was a fourth devotion in the Scripture each week instead. - Sovereign Grace produced a CD of carols old and new to go with Prepare Him Room. - For some reason, the fourth week of the Sunday School curriculum doesn't match up with the fourth week's family devotional topic.

We like this book for a devotional for Advent, it had a lot more parts to it that we didn’t do (songs to sing extra stories to read, etc)