Ideas for Children's Sermons

Children's Moment #1

Preparation: You will need a glass of water; a one-gallon plastic, resealable container — filled with water; and a potholder or folded dish cloth.

Have you ever been really thirsty? What does your mouth feel like when that happens? My mouth gets dry and it’s hard to swallow. That’s why a glass of water can taste so good! (Take a drink of water.) Where do you go to get water? (Let children name sources.) It’s as close as the faucet or the refrigerator, isn’t it? But for many people around the world, water is scarce and not always clean and safe to drink.

In fact, three of every eight people in Africa cannot get safe drinking water. Look at our congregation here this morning. Imagine if most of that whole side of the room couldn’t get clean water to drink.

And even when clean water is available, it often has to be carried a long way: sometimes many miles! Do you know who walks to the stream or the well and carries home that water? In many villages, the children are the ones who fetch the water. It takes a long time, so many of those children don’t have time to play or to go to school.

Let’s see what that might be like. (Invite the children to try to lift the closed gallon of water to see how heavy it is; then recruit an adult volunteer to put the water on his/her head as you explain that many people find they can carry more weight if they put it on their heads; use the potholder or folded cloth as a pad on the volunteer’s head and place the gallon jug on top of it.) Do you think you could carry that jug for a mile? Many of the jugs the children carry are a lot bigger than this. (Invite the children to sit again.)

This week, we give an offering called Week of Compassion. One way this offering is used is to dig wells close to villages so people can have clean water without having to walk a long way to get it.

Let’s pray.
God, each time we pick up a glass of water, help us remember how easy it is for us to get water and how hard it is for others. Help us be generous givers who help the children of other countries have life a little easier, the way you want it to be.

Amen.

Source: Church World Service/For congregational use

Children's Moment #2

Preparation: You will need a stack of saltine crackers and three glasses of water in clear glasses. Two glasses are clean, clear water and one is obviously dirty, with mud on the bottom of the glass. Recruit two adult volunteers ahead of time who come to the front and start eating lots of crackers when you call the children forward.

Sometimes, when I am hungry, I eat crackers. They fill my tummy. They also make me really thirsty. (Turn to volunteers, who have their mouths full of crackers.) Are you getting full? (nod) Good! Are you getting thirsty? (nod) Well, you are in luck! I have some water with me. (Offer the dirty glass to the volunteers whose faces register disgust as they refuse to drink it.

What’s wrong? They said they were thirsty! (Let the children respond.)

Should these volunteers drink this water? It’s not safe to drink, is it? That’s a big problem. A lot of people in our world are thirsty because the land has dried out like a crispy cracker or because a flood has come and mixed dirt and germs into the water. If they even have water, they can’t drink it.

Because disasters like droughts and floods strike, we participate in an offering called Week of Compassion. One thing we do with that offering is get clean water to thirsty people!

I have two more glasses of water here. Should we give them to our volunteers? (Hand a glass of clean water to the volunteers.) I bet it’s easier to swallow those dry crackers with some water!

Let’s pray.
God, we just turn a knob and clean water comes right out of the faucet into our glass. It’s hard for us to think what it must be like to be really thirsty with no clean water to drink. Please help us remember that in a flood or in a drought some of your children get really thirsty. Thank you for letting us help them get the water they need to live.

Amen.