Flame: Creative Children's Ministry

Next week we will be telling the final story in our series about meals Jesus shared in the Bible.  Here is how we will tell the story visually with coloured cards... Two of Jesus' followers were on the road, walking to a place called Emmaus.  They were very sad because Jesus had just died. A man, who they did not recognise, joined them on the road.  He asked them what they were talking about and why they were sad.  They explained to the man what had happened to Jesus.  They told the strange man that some of their women friends believed that Jesus had risen to new life but they didn't know what to believe as they had not seen him themselves. The man walked with them and obviously knew a lot about God and what the scriptures said (add a gold piece to the 'Jesus' figure). As they walked along, the man explained to them everything the scriptures said about who Jesus was. The men learned a lot about what God had planned! (add gold pieces to ...

Today we looked again at a meal that Jesus shared with others.  The children hear the story of the last supper at least once a year when we look at the Easter story,  but conversation with the younger ones reveals that they don't always connect the communion service with this story, so we probably can't tell it often enough! Today we focussed on the theme of 'remembering', thinking about how Jesus used the meal as a way of asking his disciples to remember him. We started off with a memory game.  We put some items on a tray and asked the children to look and remember what was there.  In secret we then removed an item and asked them to guess what was missing.  Smaller items were much harder to remember! We then asked the children about really good things they could remember from their lives.  They drew or wrote their favourite memories on pieces of paper and then we put them all inside the treasure chest to symbolise how precious they were to us. ...

Some children like to do something with their hands to help focus them when they are listening to God so here is an idea that combines a repetitive creative focus with space to listen to and think about God. Cut slits in a paper plate like so... Now wind wool between the slits so that it ends up making a cross shape with a possible frame around it! Children can wind the wool slowly as they take time to think about God and what He might be saying to them.  This activity might also lead to discussion about the colourful, intricate nature of God and how He can sometimes feel like somebody we will never fully untangle and understand! Afterwards, the plate can be used to weave prayers for people and places, either drawn or written on pieces of coloured paper.  Symbolically children will be bringing these prayers to the cross and leaving them caught in God's hands.

This week, as we talked about the good things that we have in our lives, it struck me how important it is to let the children know that God is watching over them and wants to bless them. With the 5-11s we have spoken a lot about how God can speak to us in pictures or words or ideas he puts into our head when we pray and listen to Him.  We've also talked a bit about how, when reading the Bible, certain things might 'jump out' at us that help us in our lives.   Recently we had a prayer tent at the Olympic torch celebration in Nottingham and one of the things we offered was folded up blessings from the Bible that people could just pick out of a bowl and be blessed by.  It was amazing how many people picked out a blessing that was directly relevant to what was happening in their life! So I've made some blessings for the children in a similar way... I took 6 verses from the Easy To Read version of the Bible and printed off some copies of each These are the ver...

As part of our summer Sunday sessions looking at meals Jesus had in the Bible, we looked at the story of Jesus turning water into wine.  Here's what we did... Starting game: red and blue memory game You will need a collection of cards, half of which are blue and half of which are red and all of which have the same colour backs.  I did this by sticking blue card to white card and red card to white card and then cutting them up.  Lay them out colour side down.  Children take it in turns to turn over 2 cards, hoping to make a matching colour pair.  This is great because we had 3 year olds and 11 year olds playing the same game with no problems! Story To tell the story we used a Foo Can (an illusion widely available- I got mine from Amazon).  I have a collection of illusions for various occasions and this one fitted the story really well!  Without giving away the secret it means that with, some prior preparation, you can pour clear wat...

As part of our lesson on Jesus turning water into wine we looked at the idea of God wanting to give us good things.  We encouraged the children to think of good things in their lives they could say thank you to God for and then we got down to the prayer activity! You will need:  A box, shredded paper, small treats such as lollipops and party bag filler toys (we had mini bouncy balls and mini spinners). Children take it in turns to say 'Thank you God for...' or'Thank you God for giving me good things'.  They then  put their hand into the box and pull out a treat to symbolise God's gifts!

As part of the quest to find more visual, interactive ways of storytelling, I decided to have a go at using felt. This took literally half an hour to put together and a little bit longer for drying time! First I got an A4 canvas board that cost about £1 and glued a felt sheet on it.  This is for a background to tell the stories on... Then I cut out some simple shapes from card that would be templates for body, head dress and face. I used the templates to cut out felt pieces... And then glued them together to make simple characters that could be used for most stories.  There are no obvious males and females but that's what we have imagination for! I tried them out by putting them on the board and standing it upright on the window sill.  Everything stayed stuck!   The best thing is that the children can use the figures to retell the story independently if they want to!

One of the stories we will be looking at next term is the story of creation in Genesis 1. I get really excited by visual ways of telling stories, so I thought I'd make some for us to use.  I chose to use cork mats and paper as we are trying to get away from plastic if possible! It took about an hour and a half to make them because I had to keep referring back to the Bible to make sure I was getting it right!! All you need is: Different coloured and patterned paper, scissors, glue, cork mats Cut and stick! Day 1- Darkness and light, day and night Day 2- separation of sea and sky (waters above and waters below) Day 3- Land and sea, plants Day 4- Sun to rule the day and moon to rule the night Day 5- Birds and fish Day 6- humans, animals, insects, reptiles Day 7- rest

Here is a new prayer station that I tried out with the 8-11s at New Wine this year.  It's really easy to do- you just need a collection of mirrors that the children can use to look at themselves with.  Hand mirrors were not that cheap to come by if you want a larger number, but small mirror tiles (used in card making) are widely available and cheap!  You could do this as a whole group or have it as part of a prayer corner where stillness is encouraged. The idea of the station is that the children look at themselves and ask God to show them what He loves about them. Encourage them to allow some silence so that they can process.  This can then lead to discussion about how God sees us differently to the way we sometimes see ourselves, especially when we are saying negative things about ourselves.  It might also be appropriate for children to speak out positive words about others in the group as a reflection of God's love for them. Look into the mirror. ...

Here's a really simple prayer idea we've used with our 3-5s, focussing on the idea of God keeping us safe.  It would especially fit with a story such as Jesus calming the storm where the idea of Jesus providing safety in scary times is illustrated. After telling the story, talk about the things that worry or scare us.  Who would we turn to to help us?  Discuss people like family and friends and even the police!  Then talk about how, like in the story, we can ask God to keep us safe when we are afraid. Get a piece of string and let each child choose a bead to represent themselves.  You could use any beads but heart beads to represent how God loves us, or letter beads so children can choose their initial if they want to are useful! Each child can thread their bead onto the string.  Point out to the children that it would be really easy for the beads to fall off the string if we don't tie a knot in it.  Tie the strings together in a knot and ...

There's a lot you can do with coloured cards!  Children really understand symbolism and even our 5 year olds had no problem with this prayer activity... You will need a gold card and some double sided cards (green on one side and red on the other). We discussed traffic lights and the fact that red means stop and green means go.  We talked about how sometimes we do wrong things we wish we hadn't and that can make us feel bad and stop us going forward with God as we could do (symbolised by a red 'stop' card).  God (represented by a gold card) will forgive us if we come to him and say sorry. Each child thought of something they'd done during the week that they were sorry for and then symbolically brought it to God by putting their red card next to the gold card and saying sorry.  Then, as a symbol that God forgave them, they turned the red card over to the green 'go' side. 

Over the summer we are doing scaled down children's work with one group for 3-11s!  It's not an easy task to keep everyone involved but we are having a go! This week, reflecting what the adults were doing in the main church, we looked at the calling of Levi.  Here's what we did... Game:  Ball change! In a bag put 5 red balls, 5 blue balls and 5 yellow balls.  Split children in to two teams- red team and blue team.  Children take it in turns to reach into the bag and pull out a ball.  Red team are looking for red balls, blue team are looking for blue balls.  If children pull out a ball of their colour, they keep it.  If they pull out a ball of the wrong colour, they have to put it back in the bag.  The first team to pull out all 5 balls of their colour is the winner! Story telling with coloured cards: Click  here  to go to the post showing how we told the story in a very visual way! Next we talked about the fact that...

We're always trying different ways to tell stories in visual ways, so here is what we tried today in our scaled down summer group! You will need: small square shaped cards- 1 gold, 5 double sided cards, green one side and red on the other 4 green cards with red stripes Jesus (Gold card) ...met a tax collector called Levi.  In Jesus day people thought that Tax Collectors were not good people and, like everyone, Levi had done things that he was sorry for doing.  Jesus said to Levi "Follow me!" Levi got up, left his things and followed Jesus.  Jesus, forgave his sins and helped him to change his life and come closer to God (turn card over to become green). That night, Jesus had dinner at Levi's house with other tax collectors (red cards). Some Pharisees (stripy cards to show that, though they are following the law, they are not changed in the way that Levi and Jesus' followers are) saw what Jesus was doing and said "Why are ...