Who's In Control?
Group Activities

Sermon Title: "Who's In Control?"

Scripture Reading:Mark 1:21-28

CONTROL GAME:

Let the children scatter around the room and begin doing the things that the teacher gives them directions to do which will be things that are hard to CONTROL, such as, standing on one foot, standing on their heads, doing cart wheels, standing against a wall with their feet out and only their back against the wall; and anything else that the teacher can think of that might be difficult to control.

STOP AND GO CONTROL:

The teacher will call out an activity for the children to do such as walk, run, skip,or hop. When the teacher says, "STOP", the children must stop the activity and stand perfectly still. The teacher will then call out a different activity and say "GO." The children will then begin the new activity until the teacher says, "Stop." This activity will continue with the teacher being in control.

CONTROL WALKING:

Give each child something to carry on the top of their heads, such as a boiled or plastic egg, an empty toilet paper tube, a pencil, or a paper cup. Let children walk around the room and see who can last the longest with their "controlled walking"! Talk about today's lesson and how much CONTROL that Jesus had!

CONTROLLED "ME":

Give the children a long piece of butcher paper and the child can lay on the paper and have an outline of each child drawn on the paper. Children can color the child's clothes and draw a banner on the child's picture-shirt that will say JESUS IS IN CONTROL OF ME! Children could tape their outlines to the classroom wall!

BIG EYE SURPRISE PICTURES:

Give the children a sheet of construction paper and markers draw and cut out BIG EYES and glue them to another piece of construction paper, with smaller circles to glue inside the BIG EYES. (Children will enjoy putting those smaller circles in different places inside the BIG EYES to make the eyes looked SURPRISED! Children will write, "THE PEOPLE WERE SURPRISED AT JESUS' CONTROL" under the eyes.

"GOD HAS A PLAN FOR ME" POSTER:

The children can take turns gluing on the letters for GOD HAS A PLAN FOR ME (that the teacher has cut out before class time in large letters for the poster board). After gluing on the letters, let children use various colored markers to draw their own name on the poster! Let children draw a picture of something that GOD might have a PLAN for them to do as they grow up! Talk about JESUS being in CONTROL of our lives and our PLANS!

CONTROL LOOPS:

Give the children various colors of thin strips of paper about 8" x 1". Write on the strips things that GOD is in control of (such as money, church, family, the child, my school, the weather, etc), and then make a loop with the piece of paper. Loop each thin strip of paper inside of each other, tape, and continue to add loops as time allows to form a CONTROL LOOP train and hang on the classroom wall. Have a circle PRAYER together as a class to have GOD be in CONTROL of all those things. (For younger children, the teacher or helpers could write the ideas that the children have and then let the children paste or tape their loops together.)

SCRIPTURE CONTROL WRITING:

Hand out an outline drawing of a big Bible to each child. Give children a pencil to put in their hand that they usually do NOT write with, or in their teeth, to write out words from today's Bible verse and lesson, such as "amazed", "authority", "obey Him", etc. Tell children today's lesson is about the CONTROL and power that JESUS has.

CONTROL TREAT 1:

Give the children bubble gum to chew and see who can blow the biggest bubbles.

CONTROL TREAT 2:

Let the children FEED each other a cereal or M&M treat from a spoon and try to CONTROL the spoon so no cereal or M&M's fall off the spoon! This will be very hard because children will begin to giggle! Make sure all children get a chance at feeding another child their treat for the day!

Song: "He's Got the Whole World in His Hands"

Words and Music (pdf)

MP3 Accompaniment Track