Tag Archives: Matthew

Children's Sermons

Children’s Sermon Matthew 21:23-32, 16th Sunday after Pentecost, September 28th, 2014

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Preparation: posterboards or white boards, post it notes, markers, examples
optional–random acts of kindness video

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Gather the children together with you. Tell the second part of the gospel story or retell it. One idea would be to have some men/boys act it out if you can arrange for that. But retell saying, “Jesus is telling us that what we say and what we do are important but that in the end how we show God’s love and treat others is how we live a life in God. “

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So I was thinking about this, about what I say about my faith and what I do about my faith. One thing I say about my faith in God is that I know God is with us all the time. Now how could I show that to people? (take ideas) This week one thing I did to show that is I listened to a friend of mine that I work with who told me how worried she was about her mom who lives far away. I listened to her stories about her mom and I gave her a hug and I encouraged her that she was showing love and care for her mom even while she was far away.

Here on one of my poster boards it says SAY, so I am going to take this sticky note that says I say God is with us all the time and put it here. Now this other board says DO, so I am going to take this sticky note and put Listen on it and put it up here. (If you have time, brainstorm some other ideas with the kids and do a couple more)

OPTION: Here is where you could show the random acts of kindness video or you could have it playing at a worship station.

I have lots of sticky notes and I am going to put this posters in back for our worship station today. I would like you to think of something you say about your faith or about God and something you do and put them up on the boards. You may need to help your parents or people sitting near you do this as well. (distribute sticky notes how is best for you–hand out, have in pews, have at a worship station)

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Let’s pray. Jesus, your love is with us all the time. Help us to say what we know about you to others and help us to act in ways that show your love. Amen

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+ May your lips speak of Jesus and may your actions show God’s love for the world. +

FaithCross_Worship

Put up the poster boards with SAY and DO and have sticky notes available for people to write what they Say about their faith and what they Do about their faith.

Children's Sermons

Children’s Sermon Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Matthew 18:21-35, Sept 14, 2014

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Prepare: You really don’t need any items for this, but you do need people!  You are going to need about 6 people minimum to make this work.  If you are in a place where that might be difficult to do with just children, make sure that you recruit a few helpers!

20130822-223520.jpgAsk the children if they know what forgiveness is and take a few answers.

FaithCross Today Jesus is talking about forgiveness, but not just how often to forgive, but whom to forgive.  The whole conversation starts with Peter asking how many times you should forgive, but Jesus takes it one step further . . . or maybe many, many steps further.  Jesus tells a story about a king who forgives a servant, which is great for the servant! But that same servant won’t forgive a fellow servant in the same way. The king gets mad and punishes the servant. There are all kinds of things to talk about in this story, but the one that really catches my attention is that the servant stops the forgiveness. The king starts something good, he forgives the servant, but the servant doesn’t pass it on.

Let’s try to demonstrate this. First I need a helper. Now, all of you are going to raise your hands. When my helper touches your shoulder you can lower your hands, but if I touch your should you have to put them back up. Ready? Go!

Let this go on for a minute or so to demonstrate how the helper will never really get anywhere if you are working against her/him.

Ok, this is getting us nowhere! Just like in the story, the servant worked against the king’s forgiveness and everyone suffered. Let’s change the game so that when you get to put your hands down you then touch your neighbor’s shoulder so they can put their hands down.  Ready? Go.

Wow, that when much faster! Now think about how nice it would be to live in a world where we all forgave each other and just let things go!

FaithCross_Worship For the worship station, the idea above gets taken to the whole congregation. If you have time, have the congregation “forgive” each other one at a time just like the children did, then do the next step.  If you don’t have much time just do the next step.

Next, have each person “forgive” two other people.  Start with one person touching one person’s shoulder so they can lower their hands, then the person who just lowered their hands touches two shoulders. Then each of those people touch two shoulders and so on. See how much faster it is when we forgive many others, not just one other!

20130822-224425.jpg   Forgiving God, through the grace of Jesus you forgive us no matter what we do! Help us to be forgiving people, even when it is difficult to do.  Amen

20130822-223908.jpg  Be at peace in God’s forgiveness.

~GB

Permission to use for nonprofit. When printing give credit to Faith Formation Journeys. Intellectual property rights apply.

Children's Sermons, Communications

Children’s Sermon Matthew 18: 15-20, September 7, Year A Pentecost13

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Preparation: Have different colors of paper or stickers or a simple way to put kids in groups of three. Make sure real little ones are with older ones.

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Gather children with you and ask, ‘what does it mean to gather?’ Take answers. Explain that gathering is to bring things or people together. “For example, I have these papers (stickers, whatever you are using) all gathered together and spread out. Now I am going to hand each of you one and I want you to gather with the other kids that have the same thing as you. Sit knee to knee with them once you find them”

(Hint–to make this go faster, have older kids prepped ahead of time OR give kids near each other the same object/color. You may also want older kids or teens prepared to be with a group or sit between them to help them along)

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We heard from Jesus today that when two or three are gathered in Jesus name, then he is there. Now we know that Jesus is with us all the time, even when we are alone. So what do you think happens when more people are gathered? Take answers. Talk about how Jesus is in the midst of that and helps us to reach others, show each other Jesus is there, and live out Jesus’ love.

“Now I would like you in your group to think of one way you could gather in Jesus name. Let’s start with an easy one. One way we gather with two or more is right here in worship! And when we gather here in worship we connect with each other and with God. Now you think of other places or ways you gather either here, or at home, or at school, or somewhere you volunteer.” Give them a minute. Then ask, “Ok, where are they places you gather?” Take their answers. Help them if needed. Then add to each one how that is gathering in Jesus name. For example–at home they gather for a meal and pray, or prayer before bed. At school they gather on the playground and gather in Jesus name when they are kind to a new kid or invite a lonely one in to their game. At a park they gather and Jesus is there in the way they treat each other. Maybe they are in boy scouts or girl scouts and they gather for an activity in helping someone else. Give them ways they can connect what they do each day with Jesus’ presence.

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Jesus, you promise to be with us when we are together and when we serve you. Help us to remember you are with us in all the ways we gather. Help us to remember to pray and connect with you. Thank you for your love. Amen

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Make the sign of the cross while saying:

God in my head
God in my heart
God on my left
God on my right

Children's Sermons, Weekly Devotions

Children’s Sermon Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost, Matthew 16:13-20, August 24, 2014

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Prepare: You will need a large(ish) flat rock that will be stable and not rock back and forth, like a flagstone; and a box with some marbles in it. The box should be big enough to put the stone in (or the stone should be small enough to fit in the box!)

For the worship station, try to have several more flat rocks available. Flagstone is great for this! Have several colorful permanent markers out, too.

20130822-223520.jpg  As the children gather, set the stone out on the floor (someplace where it will not scratch the floor because the children will be asked to push on it! Maybe on carpet or bring a blanket if you have wood or tile floor.)  Keep the marbles hidden in the box for now. Ask the children if any of them have a nickname, something special that their parents or a good friend calls them.

FaithCross In the Gospel story that we hear today Jesus gives one of his friends a nickname, and it is such a good nickname that we sometimes forget his real name! Jesus gives his friend Simon the nickname Peter, which means rock. Have a rock right here! What can you tell me about this rock?

(You may need to encourage some answers here. Things like, “Does it move around, or is it steady?” “Do you think that it is breakable?” etc. You want them to see the rock as strong and stable.)

You could probably stand on that rock and feel pretty sure that you won’t fall over. Now, what if I do this? I am going to put this rock in this box that has some marbles in the bottom.  What happens now? Is it still stable? Do you still think that it would be ok to stand on?

When Jesus gives Simon the name Peter he does it because he wants to build a church on Peter! Not a building, but a community of people. Jesus wants Peter to be strong and steady for the people who follow Jesus. Jesus knows that this is a good choice because Peter has figured out who Jesus is. Peter knows that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God. Other people say that Jesus is an ancient prophet who has come back to life, or that Jesus is trying to be John the Baptist – and that is kind of like the marbles under our rock. It makes everything a little less stable. Peter, however, knows who Jesus is, and doesn’t have any marbles under him to throw him off. He is steady as a rock!

FaithCross_Worship Have an area set up with the rocks and markers. Invite people to write the name of a person who is/was a rock in their faith formation.  It is not one name per rock, each rock should be covered in names!  Start with the all the rocks spread out, as they fill with names stack them together to make a cross, or a fish, or some other symbol of the Christian faith.

20130822-223749.jpg    Living God, we praise you for the people who have been rocks in our life. You have blessed us with people who build up our faith on a sure foundation. Teach us to be that sure foundation for people in our lives. Amen

20130822-223908.jpg  Be a rock for God’s church today and always!

~GB

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Children's Sermons

Children’s Sermon Pentecost 10A Matthew 15:10-28 August 17, 2014

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Preparation: The word for peace or love or hope or a mixture of them in different languages–you can do this visually with a collage that you make or use one of the links below. Prepare a handout or a worship station (more on station below under Faith+Worship)
A list of languages and the word for peace from Columbia University
An image of Peace in different languages

20130822-223315.jpgGather the children with you. Ask them listen to you as you speak the word peace–it will help if they close their eyes (or substitute another word if you like) Say the word peace in english first, then say it in a few different languages. What did you hear? (take their answers, exploring that maybe they are not sure what they heard)

20130822-223633.jpgThose were all different ways of saying peace in different languages. I want to teach this word because our readings today talk about what comes out of our mouths being what is from our heart. And that when dirty things come out of our mouths, which the bible passage called things that defile, it is like our hearts are dirty. What would some of those things be that may be ugly that we say sometimes? (help them think of things like lying, exaggerating, not nice names, teasing that hurts people, etc) And our hearts probably don’t feel happy or kind when we are saying those things, but they feel closed up and hard (make a fist with your hand) So when our hearts are open (open fist) and willing to love, words that are good and kind and peaceful come out of our mouths and those are the kinds of words that help bring different people together. Can you think of some of those words? (take answers)

One way that we start to open our hearts and minds is knowing that others people, no matter how different they are from us, are a part of God’s world and they are children of God too. And when we learn about different people our hearts start to be open and not closed. So I wanted to give you some words for peace today in other languages. (either use the worship station for this or hand out an image or list of words and their languages.) Teach one or two of the words now and then instruct the children in the worship station if you are using it.

FaithCross_WorshipHave the words in different languages available on a handout or at a station on a poster board. Have paper and markers available and have some printed paper with a big word PEACE (or love, hope or all there) Then ask people to write down the different languages around the word peace and take them home and learn them.

20130822-223749.jpgJesus, God of peace, ____, _____, ______ (insert your choice of other language for peace) Help us to see others with open hearts and help us to have words that bring healing and love come out of our mouths. Be with all those who are hurt by words and help our world live in peace. Amen

20130822-223908.jpg+Go with God’s love to bring peace in the world+

Communications

Children’s Sermon Eighth Sunday after Pentecost, Matthew 14:13-21, August 3, 2014

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Prepare: You will need several pieces of paper cut to look like loaves of bread and some crayons that you are willing to break in half or even smaller.  For the Worship Station you will need a jar with enough pennies for every person who comes to worship to take one, and another jar or basket to collect them again.  You can also have snack sized bags for them to take home the extra crayon pieces.

The pieces of paper will turn into a prayer, ideally they should be part of the Prayers of the Church or prayers of intercession.

20130822-223520.jpg  As the children gather, set aside about one crayon for every 2 or 3 children.  You want to set it up so that they need to break the crayons in order to do what you are asking them to do.

20130822-223633.jpg I love the story that we get to hear today!  Jesus does something unbelievable!  He feeds thousands of people with nothing!  Well, they had a couple of fish and 5 pieces of bread, but that’s all.  Let’s think about that for a minute, 2 fish and five pieces of bread.  How many of us are here? (take a quick head count)  Would that be enough food for us?  Maybe we should modernize this a little.  Let’s say that they had 2 sandwiches and an extra piece of bread . . . I think that we would all be still be a little hungry if that is all we had to share between us.  But Jesus is able to make that be more than enough – in fact, there was more leftover than they started with!

This is a story about sharing what we have and ending up with more than we thought there could be, so I want you to think about a place where people need more of something.  If could be people who need more food, or more clean water or more safe places to sleep or more love, you get the idea.  I am going to give each of you a loaf shaped piece of paper and you can write or draw a prayer on it and we will use it later in the worship service.  There is only one problem, I only have enough crayons for half of you, and we need to all work on this at the same time . . . what should we do?  Let’s break them into pieces and see if we have enough then!

Quickly draw or write your prayers and put them in the basket and them you are welcome to take home the crayons that you used in one of these bags.

Give what time you can – then pray to wrap up.

FaithCross_Worship For the worship station, invite people to add their penny (or more if they want) to the basket.  Estimate how many pennies you will collect and how much money that will be, then make a few signs that talk about what can be done with that money.  For example – a church that worships 450 to 500 people on a weekend could buy 2 or 3 meals at a rescue mission like the Denver Rescue Mission.  You could buy 4 or 5 chicks through something like Heifer International, or contribute to a water project.  Find several examples of how pooling a small resource from all the people gathered can make a big change in the community around you or in the world.  Invite people to pray about their donation as they make it.

20130822-224425.jpg   God of abundance, just like Jesus created more than enough out of way to little, stir up more than enough love and hope in us so that we can share your loving word with all the word.  Amen.

20130822-223908.jpg  May God give you more than enough love, more than enough peace and more than enough grace.

~GB

Permission to use for nonprofit. When printing give credit to Faith Formation Journeys. Intellectual property rights apply.