SUNDAY SCHOOL Come Follow Me Interactive Activities – NOVEMBER (week 3) Old Testament “Seek the Lord, and Ye Shall Live” (Amos; Obadiah)

• Invite class members to share truths about prophets that they found in their personal or family study of Amos 3 and Amos 7. You could make a list of their responses on the board. What other truths about prophets do we know? (For some ideas, see the Gospel Topics article “Prophets” [topics.ChurchofJesusChrist.org].) Encourage several class members to share how they gained their testimonies of the important role prophets play in God’s plan.

• How might we share with a friend why it is important to have a prophet in our day? You could list on the board questions that someone who is not a member of the Church might ask about prophets. How could we answer some of these questions using Amos 3:7–8 and 7:10–15?

• As part of your discussion about prophets, you might share one of the following videos: “We Need Living Prophets” or “Words of the Prophets” (ChurchofJesusChrist.org). How have latter-day prophets helped us draw closer to Jesus Christ?

• To begin a conversation about the famine Amos described in Amos 8:11–12, you might find it helpful to briefly review the spiritual condition of the people he was preaching to. How had the Israelites turned away from the Lord? (see, for example, Amos 2:6–8; 5:11–12). Why is it helpful to know about their downfall? Class members could then read Amos 8:11–12 and talk about why “famine” and “thirst” are good words to describe the condition of those who turn away from the Lord. Class members could also search Amos 5 for verses that can help us avoid apostasy in our lives (see, for example, verses 4, 11–12, 14–15, 25–26).

• Understanding the spiritual hunger that accompanies apostasy helps us understand the spiritual feast we enjoy because of the Restoration. You might write a few questions about the Apostasy and Restoration on the board, such as Why was there an Apostasy? What impact did the Apostasy have on God’s children? What impact did the Restoration have? Encourage class members to find answers to these and other questions using resources like the following: “The Message of the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ” in chapter 3 of Preach My Gospel ([2019], 36–39); the Gospel Topics article “Apostasy” (topics.ChurchofJesusChrist.org); the video “The Great Apostasy” (ChurchofJesusChrist.org); and the quotation in “Additional Resources.” Invite class members to talk about truths restored in our day that are especially meaningful to them.

Obadiah 1:21

“Saviours shall come up on Mount Zion.”

. . . BLESSINGS OF THE GOSPEL LOST . . .

President M. Russell Ballard taught:

“In the relatively short span of years covered by the New Testament, … the people turned against Christ and His Apostles. The collapse was so great we have come to know it as the Great Apostasy, which led to the centuries of spiritual stagnation and ignorance called the Dark Ages.

“… Our Heavenly Father loves all of His children, and He wants them all to have the blessings of the gospel in their lives. Spiritual light is not lost because God turns His back on His children. Rather, spiritual darkness results when His children turn their collective backs on Him. It is a natural consequence of bad choices made by individuals, communities, countries, and entire civilizations. This has been proven again and again throughout the course of time. One of the great lessons of this historical pattern is that our choices, both individually and collectively, do result in spiritual consequences for ourselves and for our posterity” (“Learning the Lessons of the Past,” Ensign or Liahona, May 2009, 32).