Tag Archives: holiness

Spiritually Measuring Up

Spiritually_Measuring_Up

It’s back to school time. Time to get all your school supplies and meet new friends. These games all have a ruler as the central prop and serve as a discussion start for measuring up to God’s standards. I remember the days of using a ruler to create a growth chart on the door frame. But how do we measure our growth as Christians?

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Games using a Ruler

  • Back Flip Rulers – Back flip rulers is a variation of the minute-to-win-it game “Back Flip” The objective is simple – palms down, rest several rulers on the back of your hand. Now flip them up and catch them all in the same hand. Person who can catch the most rulers at once wins.
  • Dice it Up – Another Minute-to-win-it game, youth must place a ruler into their mouth and stack a die on the end of the ruler. The die is not allowed to touch a youth’s nose or face. If the die falls off, the youth must choose another die to put on the ruler. Once the first die is in place, the player can pick up another die and put it on top of the first die. He has to continue adding a die until he’s stacked six die on top of one another. The dice have to be balanced for 3 seconds at least. First youth to be successful wins.
  • Feather Relay – Give individuals or teams a ruler with a feather, leaf or some other light object on it. The idea is to see who can go across the room and back again, keeping the elusive object on his or her ruler. If the object blows off, it must be replaced before the contestant can continue.
  • Herding Cats – Ever tried to herd a cat? They have a mind of their own. Give each team of youth one ruler and a cat (a lemon or raw egg.) Teams line up at the starting line, than at the signal, the first player pushes the cat to the goal and back using only the ruler. That player passes the ruler to the teammate who is next in line, and so on until all youth on a team have run. The team that finishes first wins. Other variations are to set up an obstacle course.
  • Longest Line – Give each group a ruler and a few school supplies if you have some. Then give the following instructions – “Using what you have, create the longest line possible.” The key to this game is they have more than the objects you have given to them. They can use a belt, a shoe lace, keys, coins, paper money, etc to create a long line of objects. We often look to God to give us resources to get things done, but we often have more than we realise if we expand our thinking.
  • Peas on a Ruler – Place a pile of peas (equal number of peas in each) for each team at one end of the room and an empty bowl for each at the opposite end. Give the first person in each line a ruler. Youth must run to their pea pile and scoop up as many peas on the ruler as they can, and bring them back and dump them into the empty bowl. They then give the rulers to the next person in line, who repeat the process. The first team to transfer its peas from the pile to the bowl is the winner. Any peas which fall along the way must also he picked up on the ruler and brought to the bowl. Players may have more than one run until all the peas are transfered, but must continue in the same order as they inititially began. They may not put the experts at the beginning of the line the second time through.
  • Ruler Catapult – Take a ruler and a square rubber pencil eraser. Place the ruler on the edge of a book or table. Place the eraser at one of the ruler and slam the other end of the ruler towards the floor. HARD. Whoever can get the eraser to fly the furthest wins!
  • Ruler Delivery – Choose a collection of objects of increasing size to be passed from the front of the line to the back of the line for each team using a ruler in each person’s mouth. First team to pass all the objects to the end of the line wins. Here are some ideas for objects: Cotton Balls, Ping Pong Balls, an egg (raw or hard boiled), marbles, lemon, apple, inflated balloon, ice cube.
  • Ruler Fencing – Players hold a ruler with a square rubber eraser on it in one hand. In the other hand the players hold an empty ruler. Then they try to knock the opponents’ eraser off the ruler without losing their own eraser.
  • Ruler of the world – roll a marble down a ruler and into a bowl. First team to do it successfully wins. Make it more difficult by using a yardstick or meter ruler.
  • Rulers – This is the game of spoons but played with rulers. Depending on the number of players, you need at least one deck of cards, and one ruler less than the number of players. Players sit in a circle with the rulers in the middle of the circle with their ends touching. To begin, each player is dealt 4 cards. The first player picks up a card from the top of the pile, and can choose to keep it, or pass it to the person on his or her left. Players can only hold a maximum of four cards. When someone gets four of a kind, he grabs a ruler. Once one person grabs a ruler, everyone else also grabs one until all the rulers are gone and 1 person is left without a ruler. Play resumes with one less player and one less ruler. Play continues until there is only one player left, the winner.
  • Standing Broad Grin – Measure everyone’s grin with a ruler to see who has the widest smile. Offer first, second, and third place prizes to the biggest smiles.
  • Tallest Tower – Bring in a variety of school supplies, including a ruler. Each team of students must create the tallest tower using the supplies you have provided. Then bring the school supplies back together and command the them to create the tallest tower. Of course the tools will simply lie where they are put. NOTE: These tools are very useful, but only when they are in someone’s hands. The same thing is true of us. We can be useful to God, and be used to teach others life changing truths, but only when we place ourselves in God’s hands.

Main Lesson Idea – Measuring Up

Measuring Up – Participants must scour the room and use a ruler find objects that match the measurements they are given… first to get them all correct gets a prize. You must first of course, make a list of measurements of various items found in the youth room or throughout the church.

Rules

  1. Teams must stay together as a group. You may not split up.
  2. Stay within the designated game area. Any group found outside the game area or in banned areas will be disqualified.
  3. No communicating or collaborating with other teams.
  4. Be respectful and courteous in everything you do. Crude language, inappropriate behavior, and offensive actions are not allowed. Respect other people’s property. Do not destroy things. When the hunt is over, there should be no sign that it took place.
  5. Respect each other. Do not cheat. Do not hinder other teams.

Scoring

  1. Only one submission for each item on the list. Multiple submissions are not allowed. Label submissions with corresponding numbers so the judges know which items are intended for which things on the list. You are not required to complete every item on the list.
  2. Teams can only qualify once for each item on the list.
  3. Stick to the Time Limit. A penalty will be imposed for each minute after the deadline that you are late. In case of a tie, the first team to finish wins.
  4. How to Win? Points will be assigned to these based on the difficulty to accomplish each, creativity and the fun factor. The team with the most points wins!

TAKE IT TO THE NEXT LEVEL

MAKE IT SPIRITUAL

  • What are some things people use to measure or evaluate living a good life?
  • What are some things people use to measure other people?
  • What are some things people use to measure themselves?
  • How do we measure a person as a success or failure?
  • What are some of the standards of measurement from God’s Word?

You might give them some helpful scriptures to write on their rulers:

  • Love – I Corinthians 13:4-7
  • Holiness – Hebrews 12.14; Revelation 21.27
  • Righteousness – 2 Corinthians 5:21, Romans 3:23
  • Christian Living – Romans 12:10-21
  • Maturity – Ephesians 4:1-13

Discussion: If your ruler had been marked wrongly, you would have found it difficult to find any of the objects. When our measurements of obedience, ourselves (pride), expectations (jealousy), comparisons with others, and timing (patience) are wrong it messes up our results. Our standards for measurement must be exact and based on God’s Word or every measurement we make will be wrong. God’s Word is to be the ruler for our life. When we use other things as rulers our measurements come out wrong.

MAKE IT PRACTICAL

In the Old Testament, the focus on godliness was living by God’s Laws and commandments. But as a Christian, the focus of the life is no longer the laws and standards, but instesd focused on a person – Christ. It’s not a set of rules but a relationship. We are to follow Christ and live for Him.

  • Romans 6:14 “For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.”
  • Romans 8:1-17
  • What difference does it make in the way you live your life to know that you are no longer under the law, but under grace?
  • Under the law you are fearful of making a mistake, but under grace you are focused on pleasing God and acting out of gratitude. How does this make a difference in how you live life?

MAKE IT PERSONAL

  • How do you measure your life? How do you measure up?
  • What are some of the things you use to measure your spiritual growth? Your spiritual journey?
  • In what way does Grace give you freedom to live more effectively for Christ?

SCRIPTURE

Romans 3:23 – “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” – We don’t measure up to God’s standard.

Ephesians 2:8-10 – “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God — not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” – Because we don’t measure up, we cannot boast. This free us to advance in good works, not out of striving to be worthy.

Ephesians 4:11-12 – “So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.” – our goal is to measure up to the life of Christ.

Galatians 2:16 – “know that a person is not justified by the works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law, because by the works of the law no one will be justified.”

Hebrews 12:1 – “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race MARKED OUT for us.” God still marks out a direction for us to strive toward as Christians.

2 Corinthians 5:21 – “God made him who had no sin to be sin[a] for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” – We don’t have to measure up to righteousness because we wear Christ’s righteousness.

Colossians 2:13-14 – “When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross.” – God wiped away the shortcoming so that before him we measure up in Christ.

2 Peter 1:3-9 – “His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love. For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But if anyone does not have them, he is nearsighted and blind, and has forgotten that he has been cleansed from his past sins.” – Now we are measure by growth in the our journey to becoming more and more Christlike.

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Clean Hands and Hearts

Here’s another summer outdoor activity that serves as a Bible Study. In the Bible, the phrase “clean hands and a pure heart” not only describes someone who is pure both inside and outside, but it also speaks of what we do (hands) and what we think (hearts).

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What You Need

  • Bible
  • towels
  • mud / dirt and water
  • bucket
  • water faucet

What to Do

  1. Mix dirt and water in a bucket to make thick mud
  2. Gather the youth around the bucket of mud and have them dip their hands in the mud.
  3. Have the youth sit down while you read Psalm 51. Fairly quickly, the mud will dry and become uncomfortable.

Take it to the Next Level

DEBRIEF

  • Ask the youth what David was feeling when he wrote this Psalm?
  • Ask them to share the circumstances of the Psalm (2 Samuel 11)?
  • Ask the youth to compare what the mud feels like to how David was feeling.
  • Ask the youth to join hands and then describe what it is like to hold a muddy hand.

MAKE IT SPIRITUAL

  • Ask youth to share ways that the mud similar to sin?
  • What would happen if we never washed our hands?

MAKE IT PRACTICAL

  • How does sin affect us when we come before God?
  • How does sin affect how God sees us?
  • How does it affect relationships with God and others around us?
  • Use some of the scriptures listed below to discuss sin and cleansing.

Closing Activity

Bring the youth to a water faucet and help them to wash their hands. Let them use towels to dry each others hands.

Ask the youth to share how they feel now, and how it feels to not only hold clean hands, but also to help others get their hands clean. How does this relate to confession, God’s cleansing, and our mission as Christians? How does clean hands affect how we live life?

Explain some people think going to church, being nice, doing good things is all you have to do to remove the sin in your life. Those things are good but they are seen on the outside we have to also clean ourselves on the inside. We can wash the dirt off our bodies, but what can we do about sin which is inside our hearts? Water cannot cannot remove sin. Only the blood of Jesus can wash away our sins. And once we are clean before God, we are given the ministry to reconcile others to God, to help them to find forgiveness in him and also be cleansed from sin.

MAKE IT PERSONAL

  • Ask each youth to have some quiet moments with God of confession, and contemplating what he has done for us and how they can help others find the cleansing of Christ.

Scriptures

Matthew 23:27-28
“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean. In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.”

Mark 7:14-15
“Again Jesus called the crowd to him and said, ‘Listen to me, everyone, and understand this. Nothing outside a person can defile them by going into them. Rather, it is what comes out of a person that defiles them.'”

Proverbs 20:9
“Who can say, ‘I have kept my heart pure; I am clean and without sin’?”

Romans 3:23
“for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”

1 John 1:9
“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”

Isaiah 1:18
“Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.”

Hebrews 10:22-23
“let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful.”

MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”

200 page e-book that explains everything you need to know when planning your very own object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed object lesson ideas and another 200 object lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms and Names / Descriptions of God.

Learn More…

Cat and Mouse

Description

One of the biggest challenges right now is the “Back to School” blues. Summer is over and the reality of school has set back in again. Everyone’s back to pursuing something. Popularity, grades, sports, maybe even aspiring to music careers on YouTube, everyone faces the pressure to perform.

This game is great to blow off some steam and burn off a little energy in the youth group. As typical in any game of tag, it is a game of pursuit. This lends itself to a discussion of the things we pursue in life and what the Bible says we should pursue.

Resources
None Needed

What to Do

  1. Choose someone to be the “cat” and another person to be the “mouse” then ask the rest of the youth to hold hands and form a circle around the “mouse”.
  2. Have every two persons in the circle to drop hands so that they are in pairs. These partners must continue holding hands and cannot let go.
  3. The cat can cut through the circle in between pairs, but the mouse must run around the outside of the circle.
  4. The objective is for the cat to tag the mouse, but there is a small twist that balances out the cat’s ability to cut through the circle. The mouse can grab any free hand (or arm) of the partners forming the circle. (The partners will be holding hands or locking arms, but the outside arm of each person will be free.) If the mouse grabs one of these outside arms/ hands, the mouse forms a new partner with the person the mouse has attached to, and the person who was not grabbed now becomes the new mouse.
  5. If the cat manages to tag the mouse, they reverse roles and the cat becomes the mouse and the mouse becomes the cat.
  6. This game can usually go on for quite a while before the youth become bored. Usually I will set a time limit and a forfeit for the person who is the cat when the time is up.

Variations

  • For Christmas you could have the Grinch chasing the Puppy, or Herod Chasing Baby Jesus.
  • For Thanksgiving have the Farmer Chasing the Turkey.
  • For Easter you could have the Pharisees Chasing the Disciples.
  • For a lesson on King David, you could have Saul chasing David.
  • For a lesson on Moses, Have Pharaoh Chasing Moses.
  • There are a lot of places in the Old Testament where People are being pursued.

Take It to the Next Level

Take it Spiritual
In life, we may sometimes be pursued and other times we may be doing the pursuing. What are some things that we pursue in life?

Here are some of the things the Bible says we should pursue.

  • Love – 1 Corinthians 14:1 (NAS)
  • Peace -1 Peter 3:11 (ASV NAS RSV NIV); Psalms 34:14 (KJV ASV NAS RSV NIV)
  • Righteousness, piety, faith, love, endurance, meekness – 1 Timothy 6:11 (NAS NIV)
  • Righteousness, faith, love, and peace – 2 Timothy 2:22 (NAS NIV)
  • Peace, Holiness – Hebrews 12:14 (NAS)
  • Prize – Philippians 3:12-14
  • Righteousness – Proverbs 15:9 (NAS RSV NIV); Romans 9:30-32 (NAS RSV NIV); Isaiah 51:1 (NAS RSV NIV)
  • Peace, Things that build others up – Romans 14:19 (NAS RSV)
  • To Know God – Hosea 6:3 (NKJV)

As you look over the things the Bible says to pursue, you’ll see they fall into the same two areas of the great commandment – To love the Lord your God with all your heart soul mind and strength, and to Love your neighbor as yourself – A right relationship with God and a right relationship with others.

Take it Personal

  • Which of these do people find difficult to pursue?
  • What stops people from pursuing these things of God?
  • When you think about your relationship with God – faith, endurance, righteousness, piety and holiness, how do you think you measure up?
  • What are you currently pursuing?
  • How can you direct that pursuit in a way that is honoring to God?
  • In what areas does your life – thoughts, attitudes, actions – need improvement?

Closing

  • What is one thing you can pursue this week in your relationship with God?
  • What is one thing you can pursue this week in your relationship with others?

Scripture References

“Pursue love, yet desire earnestly spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy.”
1 Corinthians 14:1 (NASB)

“They must turn from evil and do good; they must seek peace and pursue it.”
1 Peter 3:11 (NIV)

“But you, man of God, flee from all this, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness.”
1 Timothy 6:11 (NIV)

“Flee the evil desires of youth, and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, along with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart.”
2 Timothy 2:22

“Pursue peace with all men, and the sanctification without which no one will see the Lord.”
Hebrews 12:14 (NASB)

“Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.”
Philippians 3:12-14 (NIV)

“What then shall we say? That the Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have obtained it, a righteousness that is by faith; but the people of Israel, who pursued the law as the way of righteousness, have not attained their goal. Why not? Because they pursued it not by faith but as if it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone.”
Romans 9:30-32 (NIV)

“So then we pursue the things which make for peace and the building up of one another.”
Romans 14:19 (NASB)

“Let us know, Let us pursue the knowledge of the Lord. His going forth is established as the morning; He will come to us like the rain, Like the latter and former rain to the earth.”
Hosea 6:3 (NKJV)

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