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Stay Close To The Vine

Children's sermon
The Giant Book Of Children's Sermons
Matthew To Revelation
Object: some ivy in a pot

Good morning, boys and girls. How many of you like to grow plants? (let them answer) Working with plants is a wonderful hobby because you're working with life. You plant something and you help it grow. Some plants have flowers, some have leaves, some have fruit, and some have nuts. If you have a garden at your house, you are a very lucky person, and if you help take care of it, then you are even luckier. Working with plants teaches you a lot of things.

Jesus must have loved plants. He talked a lot about flowers, trees, and other kinds of plants that grew where he lived. One time he talked about how some plants grew and made homes for the birds. You can almost see Jesus looking in one of the big bushes that grew on the hillsides and showing his friends a bird's nest. Another time Jesus talked about how beautiful the lilies were and how God made them special. Maybe you remember all of the lilies that we had in our church on Easter to remind us of Jesus.

Jesus mentioned another plant, and he talked about it so that we could understand how we belonged to him. I brought along some ivy because it is a vine. Jesus was talking about vines and branches of the vine. He said that he was the vine.

Let's take a look at the vine. (show them the vine and how it goes from one end to the other) The vine is the main part. But look at all of the branches. (show them, or even count the branches) Now if you can imagine a very big vine that has millions and millions of branches, you can see why Jesus called himself the vine and us the branches. The branches cannot live without the vine. All of the food for the branches comes from the vine. Jesus was telling us that we cannot really live without him. He is the one who gives us life.

Maybe the next time you are working in your garden with some tomato plants you will see the vine and all of the branches. As the vine gets bigger and bigger, there are more and more branches. They also grow like the vine grows. But if you take one of the branches away from the vine it will quickly die. It cannot live without the vine.

That was a good story by Jesus and it tells us a lot about how important he is to our life. We need to keep close to Jesus so that we can grow and live very good lives together.
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Object: This message is a role play about Jesus and the fishermen. Use a fishing casting net if you can find one, but you can just use an old sheet if you can’t find an actual net.

Note: You can have some fun with this role play. Just follow the activities and expand on them as much as you choose. When the characters speak, you can either do it yourself or have the children repeat what the characters say after you.

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Jesus said, "Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch." In our worship today let us pray for courage to venture out from the safety of our church into deep water so that we may put down our nets for a catch.

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Lord Jesus, sometimes we cling to the boat and are afraid of the deep.

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Lord Jesus, sometimes we are so concerned for ourselves that we fail to trust you.

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