Sunday School Studies

Nine Year Plan

Grade Four through Grade Twelve

Our Sunday School lessons have been written for grade four all the way through high school. [We also have many courses which work well for adult classes as well]

Why were these studies written? In 1975 we were burdened to provide our local assembly with Christ-honoring and Bible-centered Sunday School lessons. We were disappointed in the lack of good Bible content in the published S.S. materials put out by the major publishing houses. So we made an attempt to provide our own materials. It took about a decade or more to complete the task. Since that time many other local churches have made use of our materials.

The philosophy: Let the Bible say what it says! And let the students see for themselves what the Bible actually says. To accomplish this we seek to ask various questions and have the students open their Bibles and find the answers in the Scripture passages that they look up. The key question we must ever ask is this: “What saith the Scripture?” (Rom. 4:3).

The approach: There are different ways that these materials can be used. The approach we usually take is as follows. First the teacher presents the lesson without having the students look at the Sunday School notes. The Bible is the only textbook. The teacher is familiar with the notes but uses the Bible in class. The students at the end of class are given the lesson which they take home and work on during the week. This reinforces what they already learned in class and gives them a homework assignment. If it is really a Sunday School, should there not be homework? We encourage the parents, if they wish, to work on the lessons as a family, perhaps as part of their family devotion or family altar time. The following week the student can turn in his lesson and the teacher can correct it (thus, the teacher has homework also!).

The arrangement: Most of these studies are made up of 13 chapters or lessons, one for each week in the quarter. After every 13 weeks the students begin a new quarterly set of Sunday School notes.

The schedule: This is the schedule that we follow here at the Middletown Bible Church:

If you teach a class with multiple grades, the above schedule will work well also.  For example, suppose you teach a Junior class made up of grades 4-6.  In the first year use the Sunday School studies listed under Grade 4. In the second year use the Sunday School studies listed under Grade 5.  In the third year use the Sunday School studies listed under Grade 6.  In the fourth year, you are ready to start again with the Grade 4 materials because all the students that were in the class when you used those materials have now graduated to higher grades (unless someone stayed back a year).

Please note:  These studies can be used outside of the Sunday School as well. They are often given to new believers to help ground them in the faith.  Many "old" believers use them as well, as home Bible studies or for use in family worship. They have also been used in Christian schools and by home-schoolers.  We have had scores of prisoners use these materials.  They can be used for evangelism and they can be used for the edification of the saints. They can be used in church and out of church.

If you have any questions about how this material might be used for your local church situation, please call George Zeller at (860) 346-0907 or e-mail him at GeorgeZeller@Juno.com

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