Here’s an idea for a kids talk on Luke 15:8-10…
Lost people are precious to God so He does everything He can to find them
Focus
What is the most precious thing you have?
It could be some jewellery. It could be a special teddy bear. It might be some clothing. Whatever it is, if something is precious to us, we won’t want to lose it.
What would you do if you lost something that was really precious to you?
If you lost something that was really precious to you, you’d look everywhere for it would you? You would do everything you could to try and find it.
Jesus told a parable about something that was very precious to someone and what happened when they lost this precious thing.
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Jesus has just told a parable about a shepherd who has 100 sheep. When he discovered that one is missing, the shepherd searched high and low to find it, and when he does he throws a great big party. As soon as Jesus finished telling this story, he told another one which sounded very similar to the one he has just told about the shepherd.
A woman has ten silver coins, they were very precious to her, but one day she discovered that one of these coins is missing. Maybe she dropped her purse and one of the coins jumped out. Whatever happened, the coin was now gone. It was missing, it had disappeared.
But losing this coin wasn’t like losing a 1p piece. This coin was precious so the woman was desperate to find it, so she begins to search. She swept the house. She looked behind the bookcase, on top of the cupboard, under the rug. She even lit a lamp so see could see whether it was in the dark corners of the room. She looked carefully making sure that she didn’t a spot.
Eventually she spots it. The silver coin had disguised itself as some dirt. She is so happy. And like the shepherd, she calls her friends and neighbours and says party with me because I’ve found this lost coin, this thing that is so precious to me.
Let’s remind ourselves of what happened in the story…
How many coins were in this story? [10]
Were the coins precious or ordinary? [precious]
How do we know that the coins were precious? [the way the woman searches the house, the way she reacts when she found the lost coin]
We’ve already seen that Jesus tells us these stories, these parables for a reason, which is to teach us something really important about God and his plans for this world. Jesus told this story to teach us that we are precious to God like the coin was precious to the woman.
Like the coin, we are lost because we have sinned against God. Sin is disobeying God through all the bad things we do and the good things that we don’t do. But because we are so precious to God, because He loves us so much, God like the woman does everything He can to find us. He sent Jesus from heaven to earth to search for lost people. Jesus came to seek and save the lost. Jesus told people how they could be found, by repenting, by saying sorry for doing the wrong thing and seeking to do the right thing.
If we repent and trust in Jesus to take the punishment we deserve, God will find us and forgive and there will be a party in heaven for us now and one day when we die or Jesus returns we will go to the great party God has prepared for us.
Wrap up
You are precious to God and He loves you very much that’s why He sent Jesus to die on the cross so that you and I can be forgiven.
You need to repent and say sorry to God for disobeying Him by the bad things you do and the good things you don’t do. And you need to trust in Jesus to save you from your sins because He died on the cross so that you can be found by God.
This is the best news ever!
Do you want to be found by God? If you do, trust in Jesus to save you from your sins.
