Who Needs a Doctor?
Group Activities

Sermon Title: "Who Needs a Doctor"

Scripture Reading: Matthew 9:9-13

SICK KIDS:

Have children get into teams of 2. One child of each team will lay down and pretend they're sick. The other child will try to quote today's Bible verse or parts of it and then help the "sick child" to get up. Then switch parts and let other child be the sick one. Discuss who needs a doctor and who needs Jesus!

BAND AID RELAY:

Divide into 2 teams. Let children run a relay race - each one has to run to the "bandaid line" and get their bandaid and open it up and place it on their next team member, who will then run to the "bandaid line" and get another bandaid and come back to the team line and place it on the next team member. Continue until everyone has a bandaid, including the first runner. Tell children our lesson today is about who needs a doctor and who needs Jesus, too! (Dollar stores have inexpensive bandages).

FIRST AID GAME TRAY:

Option 1: Place many medical firstaid items on a tray and pass around for a few minutes. Then take the tray away and ask children to write or draw pictures of all the things that they can remember being on the tray. Have discussion about Jesus coming to heal the SICK and how silly it would be to use first aid items if someone was sick or hurting. Option 2: Children can take PICTURES of medical supplies off a tray and glue onto a poster and title it with THE SICK NEED A DOCTOR AND SINNERS NEED JESUS!

SICK STICK MAN:

Let children stick a small amount of a molding clay round ball at the top of a craft stick and decorate that clay ball to look like a head (yarn for hair, mini choc chips or M&M's for eyes, etc). Give each child a bandaid to wrap around their craft stick. If you use popsicle sticks, they will be wider for the stick man and bandaid. This can be stuck into a small amount of clay so the "sick stick man" can stand! Let children write Matthew 9:12-13 on the back of the stick, or they can write, "Jesus went to those who needed Him."

FIRST AID SUPPLIES:

Blindfold children and have them reach into a bag of first aid supplies and hand that item to someone else who is blindfolded and see if they can describe and guess what the item is. Let children know that we'll be talking about who needs a doctor and who needs Jesus!

SIDEWALK CHALK SICK MAN:

Let children trace each other on the sidewalk and then each child can draw a bandaid or cast on arm or leg, etc on their tracing. Discussion about our Bible lesson today and being willing to go to those in NEED, to share Jesus' love.

PIN THE BANDAID ON SICK CHILD:

Let children take turns being blindfolded and trying to stick a bandaid on another child in the room. Have all other children stand around the room very quietly so the blindfolded child won't know who they are putting the bandaid on. When they DO find a child and stick that bandaid on, let the children try to say today's Bible verse with the teacher's help, just leaving out a word here and there for the children to fill in the correct word.

TELL OF JESUS' LOVE GAME:

Teacher can have several pictures of doors on various walls in room or hallway. (Next to each door can be a little bowl of a small candy). Let children go by two's to all the doors. After pretending to knock on a door, each team of 2 will say, "JESUS CAME TO TAKE OUR SINS AWAY", or GOD LOVES YOU, etc. Then let children take a small candy and continue on to the next door and continue until all doors have been knocked on or as time allows. Let children know that Jesus WANTS us to go to all people to tell them about JESUS' love for them.

"WE NEED JESUS" POSTER:

Give the class a very large poster board to decorate with WE NEED JESUS, or SINNERS NEED JESUS, etc. All children can then color and add their own names and a small picture of themselves on that poster for the classroom wall.

BUBBLES FUN:

Let children each blow many bubbles outside and watch the breeze blow them around. (This can also be done INSIDE if there is a fan available to blow the bubbles around). Children can be told that all those bubbles represent all the SICK and NEEDY people who need our JESUS. Let children sit down outside and talk about our Bible story today and how MANY people need us to tell them about JESUS and HIS LOVE!

BANDAGE ART:

Let each child draw a large bandage or glue a large bandage onto their construction paper. Then decorate their paper with our Bible verses today and also with the words, JESUS CAME TO HEAL THE SICK, or TELL EVERYONE ABOUT JESUS' LOVE, or WE ALL NEED JESUS TO HEAL US AS SINNERS, etc.

Song: "Jesus Heals the Broken-Hearted" by Herbert G. Tovey

Words and music (pdf)

MP3 piano accompaniment - Right click and save to your computer.

This song is in the public domain and may be freely downloaded and reproduced for ministry purposes.