Measuring Forgivness
Children's sermon
Object: A measuring cup that you might use for cooking, and something to put in the measuring cup, like sugar or flour. Also, have a plate to dump the sugar or flour in for the children to see, and a spoon or something to dip the flour or sugar into the measuring cup.
“Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.” (vv. 37-38)
Hello, everyone! Are you ready for today’s story? (Let them respond.) Who can tell me what this is? (Show the measuring cup and let them respond.) It’s a measuring cup, isn’t it? Has anyone used one of these before? (Let them respond.) Or maybe you have seen someone use a measuring cup when they are making cookies, or cake, or something else? We use it when we’re cooking and need to make sure we use the right amount of something, don’t we? Like one cup of flour, or one-half cup of sugar, or something like that.
And using a measuring cup looks easy, but it can be pretty tricky if we want to make sure we measure things correctly. Let me show you what I mean. Let’s pretend we are making cookies, and the recipe says we need to use one cup of sugar. So, maybe I just use my spoon to fill the measuring cup (Use the spoon to loosely fill the measuring cup.) There, (Show the full measuring cup,) that is one full cup, right? (Let them respond.) Well, watch this. (Dump the flour in the measuring cup onto the plate.)
Now, I’ll do it again, but this time I will dip the measuring cup into the flour (dip the measuring cup to fill the flour.) And then, I will use my spoon to press down on the flour (press the flour down,) and that gives me room to put more flour in (dip more flour into the measuring cup, pat it down and repeat until it is packed full.) Now I have another one cup of flour, don’t I? (Let them respond.) But, if I pour this cup out (pour the flour on the plate next to the first one,) if we look closely, we’ll see that I have more flour this time, don’t I? (Let them respond.) So, we have to be careful when we measure things, don’t we?
One day Jesus talked to the people about measuring things. Only Jesus wasn’t talking about how much sugar or flour to use, he was talking about how much God would forgive them if they did things they shouldn’t do. Have you ever done anything you needed to be forgiven for? Like maybe yelled at someone you shouldn’t have yelled at, or thrown something you shouldn’t have thrown, or taking something you shouldn’t have taken? (Let them respond.) Yeah, I think we have all done things we needed to be forgiven for, haven’t we? (Let them respond.)
Someone asked Jesus how many times God would forgive them if they did things like that. They wondered how God measured how much we would be forgiven for things we said or did. And that’s when Jesus told them about how God uses the measuring cup to measure how much we would be forgiven.
Jesus told them it wasn’t hard to figure out how much God would forgive them because God would forgive them exactly the same amount that they forgave other people. I don’t think Jesus had a measuring cup with him to show them, but he still talked about how God measured forgiveness.
Jesus said God will forgive you as many times as you forgive the people who might say or do something that hurts you. And he said that if we take all of the times we forgave people and put them in a measuring cup, God would see how much is in there and would then forgive us that much too. If we only forgive a few of the people who did something to us (Fill about ½ of the measuring cup,) and there are only a few of those times in the measuring cup, God will only forgive us a few times for our mistakes too. But if we forgive everyone who might hurt us (Fill the measuring cup full,) and treat those people the same way we treat everyone else, God will see all of those times in our measuring cup and will then forgive us all of our mistakes too.
God will measure how full our cup of forgiveness we gave to other people is and will then give us that same amount of forgiveness. And even better, when God fills his cup of forgiveness to give to us (Pat down the full cup and add more flour,) God will make sure the cup is as full of forgiveness as it can be for us.
The next time you see a measuring cup, maybe when someone is baking cookies, I hope you remember the day that Jesus told people how God measures how much to forgive us and how important it is that we forgive everyone who says or does something that hurts us. God wants us to forgive everyone and not stay angry with anyone and treat them like an enemy. God does not love some people more than others. God loves every one of us no matter who we are, what we have, where we are from, or even what we have done.
I hope you will remember how much God loves you, and how much God wants us to love other people and help them know how much God loves them, too.
Let’s have our prayer and ask God to help us remember to do the things God wants us to do to take care of each other.
Prayer:
Dear God, thank you for reminding us how much you love us. Please help us remember that you love all of the people you have created and help us let the people around us know that we love them just like Jesus loves us. Amen.
“Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.” (vv. 37-38)
Hello, everyone! Are you ready for today’s story? (Let them respond.) Who can tell me what this is? (Show the measuring cup and let them respond.) It’s a measuring cup, isn’t it? Has anyone used one of these before? (Let them respond.) Or maybe you have seen someone use a measuring cup when they are making cookies, or cake, or something else? We use it when we’re cooking and need to make sure we use the right amount of something, don’t we? Like one cup of flour, or one-half cup of sugar, or something like that.
And using a measuring cup looks easy, but it can be pretty tricky if we want to make sure we measure things correctly. Let me show you what I mean. Let’s pretend we are making cookies, and the recipe says we need to use one cup of sugar. So, maybe I just use my spoon to fill the measuring cup (Use the spoon to loosely fill the measuring cup.) There, (Show the full measuring cup,) that is one full cup, right? (Let them respond.) Well, watch this. (Dump the flour in the measuring cup onto the plate.)
Now, I’ll do it again, but this time I will dip the measuring cup into the flour (dip the measuring cup to fill the flour.) And then, I will use my spoon to press down on the flour (press the flour down,) and that gives me room to put more flour in (dip more flour into the measuring cup, pat it down and repeat until it is packed full.) Now I have another one cup of flour, don’t I? (Let them respond.) But, if I pour this cup out (pour the flour on the plate next to the first one,) if we look closely, we’ll see that I have more flour this time, don’t I? (Let them respond.) So, we have to be careful when we measure things, don’t we?
One day Jesus talked to the people about measuring things. Only Jesus wasn’t talking about how much sugar or flour to use, he was talking about how much God would forgive them if they did things they shouldn’t do. Have you ever done anything you needed to be forgiven for? Like maybe yelled at someone you shouldn’t have yelled at, or thrown something you shouldn’t have thrown, or taking something you shouldn’t have taken? (Let them respond.) Yeah, I think we have all done things we needed to be forgiven for, haven’t we? (Let them respond.)
Someone asked Jesus how many times God would forgive them if they did things like that. They wondered how God measured how much we would be forgiven for things we said or did. And that’s when Jesus told them about how God uses the measuring cup to measure how much we would be forgiven.
Jesus told them it wasn’t hard to figure out how much God would forgive them because God would forgive them exactly the same amount that they forgave other people. I don’t think Jesus had a measuring cup with him to show them, but he still talked about how God measured forgiveness.
Jesus said God will forgive you as many times as you forgive the people who might say or do something that hurts you. And he said that if we take all of the times we forgave people and put them in a measuring cup, God would see how much is in there and would then forgive us that much too. If we only forgive a few of the people who did something to us (Fill about ½ of the measuring cup,) and there are only a few of those times in the measuring cup, God will only forgive us a few times for our mistakes too. But if we forgive everyone who might hurt us (Fill the measuring cup full,) and treat those people the same way we treat everyone else, God will see all of those times in our measuring cup and will then forgive us all of our mistakes too.
God will measure how full our cup of forgiveness we gave to other people is and will then give us that same amount of forgiveness. And even better, when God fills his cup of forgiveness to give to us (Pat down the full cup and add more flour,) God will make sure the cup is as full of forgiveness as it can be for us.
The next time you see a measuring cup, maybe when someone is baking cookies, I hope you remember the day that Jesus told people how God measures how much to forgive us and how important it is that we forgive everyone who says or does something that hurts us. God wants us to forgive everyone and not stay angry with anyone and treat them like an enemy. God does not love some people more than others. God loves every one of us no matter who we are, what we have, where we are from, or even what we have done.
I hope you will remember how much God loves you, and how much God wants us to love other people and help them know how much God loves them, too.
Let’s have our prayer and ask God to help us remember to do the things God wants us to do to take care of each other.
Prayer:
Dear God, thank you for reminding us how much you love us. Please help us remember that you love all of the people you have created and help us let the people around us know that we love them just like Jesus loves us. Amen.
