parables – The Well Creative Children's ministry

As we come further into spring, it’s a great time to tell the parable of the sower and to think about how we grow as disciples.

Here are some helpful resources to help you to do this:

Use the Parable of the Sower Playdough Mat (above). Click here to print off and use. For repeated use, it really helps to laminate the sheet!

Think about how seeds might grow on different types of ground by testing it out! Make ‘seed balls’ and then throw them into your garden and watch what happens as nature takes its course. This is a great set of instructions to help you to get started. Be aware that it might get messy!

Go into the garden and look at where plants are growing and where they aren’t. What do you notice?

Watch this video of the story, using photos taken in Israel of the 4 different types of land.

Use junk to make a model of something that really sticks out to you from the story. Share what you have made and why.

Talk about:

What helps plants to grow?
What helps people to grow?
What helps us to grow in knowing more about Jesus?

Pray:

Eat some fruit and ask God to help us grow in knowing about and loving Jesus and in loving each other.

There are so many avenues you could explore when thinking about this short parable! There is so much here about the value of small beginnings with the gospel, not underestimating the power and potential of the kingdom of God and thinking about how we plant seeds in other people’s lives to help them see God’s love. This craft, though, is a great way of helping children to think about what their ‘home’ in the kingdom of heaven might be like.

He told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed,which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches.” Matthew 13: 31-32

You will need: long twigs that have fallen from a tree (there are normally loads on the ground wherever you find trees!) buttons, beads, feathers, glue, glitter, pipe cleaners, wool, paint.

Talk about the home that the birds find in the branches of the mustard tree, just like the Kingdom of heaven is a home where we are all welcome. What would your branch look like if you found a place to perch in this Kingdom tree? Let children decorate their branch and use the time to chat to them about what the kingdom of heaven might be like.