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Children's sermon
Luke 4:14-21
Epiphany 3 | Ordinary Time 3 - C
John Jamison
He went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. He stood up to read, and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written:

“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” (vv. 16-21)

Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him. He began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

* * *

Object: A photo of your family.

* * *

Hello, everyone! (Let them respond.) I have a question for you today. Are you ready? (Let them respond.) Great. Here is my question. We all want to try and follow Jesus, and do the things God wants us to do, right? (Let them respond.) Who can tell me what you think is the hardest thing for us to do to do that? (Let them respond.) There can be a lot of things that are hard, but do you know what I think the absolute hardest thing is? (Let them respond.) I’ll show what I think the hardest thing to do is. (Show the photo.) This is a photo of my family. And I think the hardest thing for us to do is to do what God wants us to do when we are at home with our family. At least I know that can be the hardest thing for me.

Have you ever noticed that even though we are trying to do the things God wants us to do, sometimes we act differently when we are at home than we do when we are someplace with other people? We do that sometimes, don’t we? (Let them respond.) When we are at school, or at church, or even when we are just hanging around with other people, we sometimes act differently than we do at home, don’t we? (Let them respond.) We know our family so well, and they know us so well, that we sometimes forget about what God wants us to do, and we say and do things to them that we would never say to other people. Has that ever happened to you? (Let them respond.) It has to me. Sometimes it can be hard to follow Jesus when we are at home with our families.

Today’s story makes me think Jesus knew that too. After Jesus was baptized, he started traveling around talking to people about God, and trying to show them that he loved them as much as God loved them. Then one day, he went back to his hometown of Nazareth to visit his family and all of the other people he grew up with there. They all remembered how he talked and acted when he lived there with them and I’ll bet they thought he would be the same now, don’t you? (Let them respond.) But Jesus wasn’t the same as he was before, was he? (Let them respond.) Now he was trying very hard to do the things God wanted him to do. Even at home.

So, one day when they all went to the synagogue, which is like when we go to church, they asked Jesus to read the scripture for them. Jesus got up and read, “The Spirit of the Lord is on me.” And when someone said the Spirit was with them, it meant they were trying to do what God wanted them to do. When he finished reading, he looked around at everyone and he said, “Today I tell you that from now on I am going to try and do what God has asked me to do and show everyone how much God loves everyone one of us, no matter where we are.”

I hope you will remember how much God loves you, and how much God wants us to love other people and do the best we can to help take care of those other people and make sure they know how much we love them. Even our families at home. (Show the photo.)

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.
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Contents
"The Way to God" by Peter Andrew Smith
"Looking Up" by David O. Bales


* * * * * * * *


The Way to God
by Peter Andrew Smith
Isaiah 58:1-9a (9b-12)

In his story "The Way to God," Peter Andrew Smith tells of a people seeking to know God in their lives who discover the answer is not about what they do but about how they live.

* * *

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This is a dangerous psalm -- dangerous, because it is so open to misinterpretation.

"Happy are those who fear the Lord...." Well, who could quarrel with that? Yet this psalm goes on to describe, in concrete terms, exactly what form that happiness takes: "Their descendants will be mighty in the land.... Wealth and riches are in their houses" (vv. 2a, 3a).

Power? Wealth? Are these the fruits of a godly life? The psalmist seems to think so.

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Lesson 1: Isaiah 58:1--9a (9b--12) (C); Isaiah 58:7--10 (RC)
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I had a much-loved professor in seminary who confessed to some of us over coffee one day that he frequently came home from church and was so frustrated he had to go out and dig in the garden, even in the middle of winter. Robert Louis Stevenson once recorded in his diary, as if it were a surprise, "I went to church today and am not depressed." Someone has said, "I feel like unscrewing my head and putting it underneath the pew every time I go to church." Thoughts like these are often expressed by people who have dropped out of church, especially youth and young adults.
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Sometimes when we read a passage of scripture, we may need to pay careful attention to who in the text is speaking. Our understanding of the words themselves may change, depending on whose mouth they come from. If we are reading Job, we need to know which character is speaking in the passage. If Job's friends are talking, we know their words cannot be trusted. They are too self-righteous. Sometimes, we are not sure who is speaking. Job 28 is a beautiful poem extolling the virtue of wisdom, but we can't be sure who delivers this elegant piece.
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Of all the pressing questions of the day, a sign on one person's desk asks, "How much can I sin and still go to heaven?" The question seems amusing until we stop to think about it. Inherent in this question is a bold-faced confession that there is no interest at all in pursuing a life shaped wholly by the spirit of God, but at the same time we do not want to be so recklessly sacrilegious that we forfeit completely the rewards of the hereafter.
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A Japanese legend says a pious Buddhist monk died and went to heaven. He was taken on a sightseeing tour and gazed in wonder at the lovely mansions built of marble and gold and precious stones. It was all so beautiful, exactly as he pictured it, until he came to a large room that looked like a merchant's shop. Lining the walls were shelves on which were piled and labeled what looked like dried mushrooms. On closer examination, he saw they were actually human ears.
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God Of Grace And God Of Glory (CBH366, NCH436, PH420, UM577)
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This Little Light Of Mine (CBH401, NCH524, 525, UM585)
Ask Me What Great Thing I Know (NCH49, UM192, PH433)
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Emphasis Preaching Journal

One of the difficulties that confronts us who drive our vehicles is forgetting to turn off the lights and returning to the car after some hours only to discover a dead battery. I have found that the problem occurs most often when I have been driving during a storm in daytime and had to turn on headlights in order to be seen by other drivers. By the time I get to my destination the rain has often ceased, and the sun is shining brightly. The problem happens, too, when we drive into a brightly lighted parking lot at night.
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CSSPlus

Good morning, boys and girls. I brought some salt with me this morning. (Show the salt.) What do we use salt for? (Let them answer.) We use it for flavoring food. How many of you put salt on your popcorn? (Let them answer.) What else do we use salt for? (Let them answer.) We put salt on the sidewalks in winter to keep us from slipping. We put salt in water softeners to soften our water.

In this morning's lesson Jesus said that we are the salt of the earth. What do you think he meant by that? (Let them answer.) In Jesus' time salt was very important. It was used to keep food
Good morning! Once Jesus told a whole crowd of people who
had come to hear him preach that they couldn't get into Heaven
unless they were more "righteous" than all the religious leaders
of that day. Does anyone know what that word means? What does it
mean to be righteous? (Let them answer.) It means to be good, to
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that? Was he telling people that they had to do everything
perfectly in this life in order to get into Heaven? (Let them
answer.)
Good morning! How many of you own your own Bible? (Let them
answer.) When you read the Bible, do you find some things that
are hard to understand? (Let them answer.) Yes, I think there are
some tough things to comprehend in the Bible. After all, the
Bible is God's Word, and it's not always easy to understand God.
He is so much greater than we are and much more complex.

Now, I brought a New Testament with me this morning and I
want someone to read a verse for us. Can I have a volunteer? (Let
Teachers and Parents: The most common false doctrine, even
among some who consider themselves strong Christians, is that we
can earn our way into Heaven by our own works. Our children must
learn the basic Christian truth that Heaven is a gift of God and
that there is no way to be righteous enough to deserve it. We
must rely on the righteousness of Christ for our ticket into
Heaven.

* Make white paper ponchos with the name JESUS written in
large letters on each one. (A large hole for the head in a big

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