This Sunday’s lectionary addresses the cost of discipleship. Both the Old Testament lesson (1 Kings 19:15-16, 19-21) and the Gospel (Luke 9:51-62) talk about exactly what is expected of a follower of Christ. Weave these expectations into your discussion of Galatians.
Today’s object is a superhero action figure. Use your favorite: Batman, Spiderman, Superman, Wonder Woman . . . whatever.
All superheroes have a mission. They fight evil. Galatians gives us a good list for any writer of action stories to reference.
fornication
impurity
licentiousness
idolatry
sorcery
enmities
strife
jealousy
anger
quarrels
dissensions
factions
envy
drunkenness
carousing, and things like these.
Each action hero has certain strengths and weaknesses. Knowing them is part of the fun in following the story. Will Superman finally be overcome by kryptonite? Will his bullet proof outfit save him? Will he remember to use his X-ray vision?
Talk about your superheroes’ special qualities.
Ask your congregation to create a superhero to fight the list of evils presented in Galatians. What special powers would their hero have? What weaknesses might hinder him or her in conquering evil?
This should lead to an interesting discussion. Have fun with it.
In the end, refer your congregation to the qualities that Paul lists as antidotes for evil.
By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is
love
joy
peace
patience
kindness
generosity
faithfulness
gentleness
and self-control.
How many of these qualities did you give your superhero? Are these qualities enough to get the job done?
Today’s object is a skill game — paddle ball (a paddle with a rubber ball attached with an elastic string) or a cup and ball toy (bilbo catcher) pictured here.
This lesson can be adapted for use with children or adults.
The lessons in today’s lectionary reference things that are habits in our lives. Habits are a demonstration of an acquired skill. There are good habits and bad habits. Everyone has them!
Practice whichever game you choose until you can paddle a good series or catch the ball with ease. You’ll want to show your skill as you start your sermon — perhaps missing and improving as you talk.
The widow in the Old Testament story is going about her daily routine, knowing that this may be the last time she ever prepares a meal for her son. Along comes Elijah and claims her last morsel. Habits can have predictable results and can be alarming.
The Psalm today is part of a series of psalms that repeat the theme of praising the Lord, beginning with the psalmist’s own voice of praise and ultimately including everything that has breath. Habits can gain momentum.
The tables are turned in the Epistle, where Jesus’ one-time sacrifice is contrasted to the habits of priests who carry the sacrificial animal blood into the temple again and again. Good habits once, but now they are unnecessary. Habits can become useless.
And finally we come to the Gospel story of the widow’s mite. Here, Jesus is watching a ritual take place. One after another, the faithful come to the temple with their offerings. The rich make quite a spectacle of their giving and they are probably accustomed to making their offerings when there is a good audience. The widow is also part of the habit of giving. It is so ingrained that she gives from the little she has with no Elijah promising her an endless supply of oil and bread. Habits can define character.
The point of the object is to demonstrate how with practice the challenges we undertake get easier and easier. Actions that we undertake as challenging become habits. It’s tough to hit or catch the ball at first. Eventually the game is conquered. Muscle memory and balance are imprinted on the brain. Like riding a bicycle, it’s not forgotten. (You could use a bicycle as your object!) Point out that the motivations for the habits also become embedded in our minds. Watch you don’t get too adept at your challenge game! You’ll risk looking like the rich givers—showing off!
You don’t have a reason for hitting or catching the ball except the satisfaction of achieving the goal. What are the motives behind your worship habits? The motives mattered more than the gift to Jesus.
Our faith lives are built on habits—habits of prayer, praise, thanksgiving, attendance and giving. We don’t even stop to think.
If this is your church’s stewardship Sunday, you might point out that the habits of giving need to be reexamined now and then—new talents and skills discovered, new obstacles overcome.
You could point out that habits in giving need updating. $5 in the offering plate in 1970 doesn’t go as far as $5 in the offering plate today.
But mostly, today’s lesson is about the overall value of practicing faith skills until they are part of our lives and we are willing to give to God without measuring the cost to ourselves.
Today’s objects are a checkbook and a pen, but keep them hidden.
Ask your congregations to name some occasions when they routinely pray.
You’ll get answers like
when someone is sick
before we eat
when I wake up
when I go to bed
when I’m scared
in church
with my children
on the fourth down
When ideas die down, pull out the check book and your pen. Start to write but stop quickly.
Point out that the answer to many of their prayers involve their checkbooks. They write checks to pay for groceries and doctors, etc. Even sports teams try to solve their problems by offering attractive salaries.
Yet how many of us pray before we write a check?
Now refer to the lectionary reading about the man who came to Jesus on his knees. He was a good man by any measure. But something was missing. Jesus reminded him to keep the commandments. This man had checked everything on that list. Been there; done that!
On top of his impeccable values, he was a man of means. He could buy his way out of any problem. But he still felt lost.
But Jesus pointed out to him that the blessings of riches mean nothing if they cannot be shared with others who are equally important to God. Wealth has a way of stealing our attention from the reasons God put us here on earth—to be part of community. We are lost when we are separated from community.
This alienation had brought the rich, youn man to his knees. He longed to be closer to God. But to get closer to God he had to rebuild his relationships with the people around him. That meant giving up what separated him from others in God’s creation.
Turn back to your checkbook. You might get down on your knees at this point.
Suggest that each time they reach for their checkbook (or even their credit card), they offer a prayer just as they would before taking a bite to eat.
Pray for wise decisions with money.
Pray that your wealth is a tool for good.
Pray with thanksgiving that God has blessed you with the ability to decide how to use your wealth.
Make prayer about your spending a habit. And remember to think of others!
In Mark 9:38-50, the disciples are upset with some copycat miracle workers who are exorcising demons in Jesus’ name. The disciples bring the matter to Jesus’ attention. Someone is stepping on your (they probably meant “our”) territory.
Hey! They had tried to stop them. But the scoundrels just weren’t listening! Surely, Jesus would put the demon chasers in their place.
The disciples wanted Jesus to draw a line — decide who were the true followers of Christ. Keep the kingdom tidy.
But Jesus dismisses the disciples’ concerns. He focuses on them.
He encourages the disciples to loosen up. These new miracle workers aren’t going to diminish His abilities. Why bother drawing lines between people who are working for the same cause?
Here’s a little known fact about goldfish. They were naturally plain old, grey carp.
Japanese and Chinese hobbyists carefully bred their pets to bring out the bright colors.
Today, goldfish are known for their splendor.
And where did it get them? Today most of the beautiful goldfish, chosen for their color and carefully bred to ensure colorful offspring, are kept in a bowl. The chosen fish are destined to live their lives separated from other fish and the world. They will swim all day, every day, in circles peering through their concave barriers at the world they were part of back when they were grey. Their beauty has indeed set them apart — to what end?
Talk with your congregation about the walls they might be putting up between themselves and the rest of God’s glorious creation. Why do the barriers seem like a good idea? When the harshest barriers are at last broken, what result was feared? What result actually came about?
The walls between faiths.
The walls between denominations.
The walls between genders and races.
The walls between educated workers and manual labor.
The walls between old and young.
The walls of culture and language.
Think about the disciples. Did their special status as chosen children of God divide them from the world or prepare them to join the world?
What about us? What walls do we put up? What purpose do we think they serve? What unintentional purposes result?
You are late for a meeting, but there is no parking spot in sight. At last you see a car pulling away. Finally and none too soon! You parallel park, annoyed at the cars that pass impatiently, making it unsafe to steer your car into the spot. At last you are in. You jump out of the car, lock the doors, and rush to the meter. You look for instructions. The meter takes only quarters. You dig in your wallet or purse. All you can find is a $20 bill. You look at the nearby stores. Might they change a $20 bill so that you can put a few quarters in the parking meter? You look up the street. There’s the meter reader writing a ticket just a half block away.
Suddenly the quarter you don’t have is worth more than $20 bill you do have.
(If you tell this story to children, use a vending machine that takes only quarters, but the parents provided only a dollar bill.)
In today’s Gospel, Jesus encounters the disciples in an animated conversation. He asks, “What are fellows talking about?”…as if he doesn’t know. They are embarrassed. They have been bragging to one another about their value to the Master. There is little they can do but listen, red-faced, as Jesus begins to lecture them about greatness.
The recent chapters of Mark test the disciples over and over. Jesus is challenging conventional ideas. The disciples’ world is turning upside down. There are miracles and strange and uncomfortable conversations. No wonder the disciples have used their alone time to sort some things out among themselves.
But in butts Jesus, and their ideas are once again thrown out the window.
At last he reaches for a small child, embraces the child and uses the child as an “object” lesson. It’s the littlest among you that is worth the most. Not the smartest, not the most talented, the one with the best job, or the biggest house.
Pull a quarter out of your pocket (oops! you had one along) and flip it a few times.
Ask them to think about this the next time they need a quarter.
Today’s object is a dog. Use a stuffed dog, a picture of a dog, or even your own pet. You might consider using two stuffed dogs—one of pedigree to represent the Jews and one of less definite breeding to represent the Gentiles.
Mark tells two stories in this Sunday’s Gospel.
The first story tells Jesus’ hesitance to extend his message beyond the people of Israel. Jesus uses the metaphor of children and dogs.
Is is right to take the food meant for your children and throw it to the dogs? he asks.
The Gentile women is quick-witted. Her answer impresses the great teacher. Even the dogs eat the children’s crumbs and that’s all I’m asking for — a crumb.
Jesus hears the woman and is moved. Her daughter is healed.
Point out the woman could have stormed off in a huff at being likened to a dog. Even today, as lovable as our pets are, we don’t refer to someone as a dog without expecting a fight! But this woman stood up to the miracle worker — who might have struck her down on the spot for impertinence.
You can talk a bit about the most endearing quality of dogs — their loyalty and trust — qualities that played out in today’s lesson.
The second story is about the man with a speech impediment. It, too, is a strange story. Jesus takes the man aside and heals him in private of his speech impediment. For the first time in his life this man can speak and be understood. Jesus orders the crowd, who reappear at the end of the story, to keep the report of this miracle under wraps.
You can tie the dog analogy to this second lesson. A favorite trick to teach a dog is to speak or bark upon command. It’s a lot harder to teach a dog to be quiet! Yet that is what Jesus asks of the healed man and the crowd of people. “Do not tell anyone.”
Order your dog or dog object to not bark. If you have a group of children or youth, you might enlist them in your story-telling by asking them ahead of time to bark whenever you give the order “do not bark” or “be quiet.”
These passages remain a bit puzzling. Why was Jesus reluctant to heal a child of a non-Jew? Later, why did he charge people to do something that goes entirely against human nature?
Why do we hesitate to embrace people different from us? Why do we admire dogs of pedigree?
We never set out to be experts in object lessons, although we were major contributors to a site specializing in children’s sermons before we (and our children) were evicted from our church.
Strange things can happen on the internet. Last November we visited a small church in Fort Washington, Pa. We wrote about the pastor delivering an object lesson in a church where there were no children present. It seemed to be more popular with adults than such sermons are with children.
That post, now about nine months old, still gets daily search engine traffic. In response to this interest, we have started to post an object lesson corresponding to the lectionary readings for the upcoming Sunday. We’ve posted about six so far and aim to try to add a new post featuring Adult Object Lessons each Tuesday.
Although we use an object (most of the time) sometimes we just present ideas for interactive lessons with adults. Many can be adapted for use with both children and adults—sometimes encouraging the age extremes to engage with one another.
We leave most of the theological interpretation to theologians. We just make some suggestions on how the topic might be handled.
We’re not quite sure what we are getting into or how much discipline it will take, but we’ll make the effort. Hope it helps!
Today’s object lesson is a puzzle. Print the empty grid in the bulletin with the following list of Words.
TWO
FISHES
FIVE
LOAVES
FATHER
BREAD
OF
LIFE
ETERNAL
SPIRIT
BLOOD
FLESH
SON OF MAN
SPIRIT
Say something along these lines.
In your bulletin is a list of words. They are all part of the story we’ve been reading from Chapter 6 of the Book of John for the last few weeks. There is a crossword grid printed in the bulletin. While I talk to you this morning, I invite you to fit the words into the grid.
It’s a puzzle—a game.
And that’s what has been happening in our Gospel lesson for the last few weeks.
Jesus has been playing a sort of game with his disciples—a teaching game—trying to get his disciples and other followers thinking. He knows what he is up to. The scripture notes this from the start when Philip first posed the immediate problem facing them—feeding five thousand hungry people with five small loaves of bread and five fishes.
Oh, the people are hungry, are they? Well, where do you suggest we buy them food?
From that point on the whole chapter is a puzzle with lots of pieces to put together. Jesus knows the answers and he knows that the disciples aren’t yet on the same page with Him. He throws them clues left and right, accented with a touch of the supernatural here and there.
He performs the miraculous feeding. This becomes the metaphor for His object lesson. But that’s just the beginning. Strange happenings abound.
He tries to get away. The disciples leave Him behind. He appears on the water. The boat reaches its destination the minute He climbs on board. Crowds keep searching for Him. When they find Him, He keeps going back to the food metaphor.
I am the Bread of Life.
Then He starts talking about being the Son of Man and then about the Father who sent Him. Talk of the Bread of Life turns to talk of flesh and blood. A true puzzle.
During the long story, the action moves from the hillside to the desert to the sea and the opposite shore and ends with Jesus continuing the story from the temple in Capernaum.
Point out that we read this story today with the benefit of knowing what is about to happen—the Last Supper, the Betrayal, the Crucifixion and the Resurrection. The puzzle solvers of Galilee were truly perplexed. A good number threw up their hands and walked away.
The chapter ends with Peter’s answer to the puzzle. As some of Jesus’ followers are fleeing, he states a simple creed. We repeat this regularly in our worship services
“Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and to know that you are the Holy One of God.”
That was Peter’s answer to the puzzle. You might have the congregation repeat these words.
The Gospel story of Jesus Feeding the Multitude is a lot about numbers.
Use your fingers as your objects and start counting. Or for a modern flair, use a calculator.
The boy had five barley loaves and two fish.
There were 5000 in the crowd.
When all had eaten their fill, the disciples gathered 12 baskets of leftovers.
Numerologists will read special meaning into these passages.
Five barley loaves (five=grace)
Two fish (two=witness)
for a total of seven (seven=perfection)
Twelve is the number of governance. (12 tribes, 12 disciples)
The story—at least for us today—is less about numbers and more about miracles.
The audience that day would have known the Old Testament story that is paired with this gospel. Elisha gives the orders in this story. People are fed. Food is leftover. It was no less newsworthy because this miracle fed only 100.
The New Testament narrative is meant to leave no doubt. Jesus can perform miracles—miracles that surpass Elisha’s and also surpass our expectations and satisfy our desires. Elaborate on this.
If you are celebrating Communion, do a quick calculation of how many might come to the altar a bit later in the service. Estimate the number that might be coming to other altars in other churches in your neighborhood and beyond at the same time. Add this number to the Bible’s 5000 and sense an ongong miracle.
Sunday’s texts are all about love. The gospel is John 15:9-17 and is the focus of much of John’s life teachings—The New Commandment.
This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. (v.15)
It is Jesus’ last but abiding message to the world before returning to heaven.
Such a simple commandment, but so easy for us to forget as we tend to live our lives in a world measured by justice, not love.
Try acting out this scenario.
Tell a few members in advance that they will be taking part in a play. But don’t tell them too much. Make sure they are members with a sense of humor and make them realize that they will be role-playing.
Create a mock court. You might want to put on a black robe or hold a gavel in you hand to indicate that you are changing roles. Use the pulpit as a judge’s bench or stand on the chancel steps, indicating that you are “in charge.”
Have someone declare “Order in the court” and “All rise” as you make your entrance in your new persona.
Introduce yourself as “judge” or add to the unreality with a more gloried made-up title.
Call your pre-selected members forward one by one. Charge them with an infraction. Make something up: nodding off during the sermon, singing off key, arriving late or skipping out before the offering. Nothing serious. Keep it light.
As each one is charged ask him or her to stand aside to await sentencing.
After all your “perpetrators” are properly charged, pose a question to the congregation. Ask them for sentencing ideas. You can do this for each one or generally, depending on how much time you want to devote.
In the end, call all the offenders back and give each one the same sentence: To love one another. You can do this one by one with an elaborate build up ending with “Love one another.” Use your imagination.
Hit the pulpit with your gavel. Send everyone back to his or her seat.
End the mock court signaling your court crier to call “All rise” and declaring the session to be over.
Get rid of the gavel and black robe, return to your role as preacher and elaborate a bit on the message of the day.
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On Isaiah 30:15b
Be calm. Wait. Wait. Commit your cause to God. He will make it succeed. Look for Him a little at a time. Wait. Wait. But since this waiting seems long to the flesh and appears like death, the flesh always wavers. But keep faith. Patience will overcome wickedness.
—Martin Luther
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