CREATIVE FAMILY WORSHIP IDEAS
Aim: To understand that we were designed by God to live together, share together and grow
together.
Bible Background
In Matthew 22:37-40 Jesus said that there were two foundational requirements for living life in
the right way. First: ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with
all your mind’ (v37-38). Second: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself’ (v39, all Bible quotations from
New International Version).
The apostle John reminds us that we cannot just focus on developing a religious life. Loving God
requires engagement with other people in loving and caring community:
‘For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God,
whom they have not seen. And he has given us this command: anyone who loves God must also
love their brother and sister’ (1 John 4:20-21).
In Acts 2:42, the Early Church demonstrated their desire to obey Jesus’ commandments in the
way in which they supported and invested in one another.
This requirement to express our faith and love for God is not demanded of us unreasonably,
for God has designed us to live in this way. When we obey this command to love our neighbour
as ourselves everyone is stronger and more able to fulfil their potential, as is represented in
Ecclesiastes 4:9-12.
Activity Stations
1. Community Dove
Draw a large outline of a dove and fill it with the thumbprints of everyone in the group. Try to
use as many different coloured paints for this as possible to achieve a lovely bright picture for
display. Entitle the finished picture, Together We Rise. Alternatively give each person an A4 size
sheet with a photocopy of a dove outline and ask them to fill it with thumbprints collected from
everyone else in the group. Underneath the picture get everyone to do an extra thumbprint
alongside their name so that this can become a reminder to pray for one another.
You will need: Large sheet of sugar paper for poster, A4 photocopies of dove outline (see the
end of this document), poster paints, pens.
Talk about: Just as a bird needs two wings to be able to fly, we need one another to be able to
reach our goals.
2. Loom Bracelets
Use this popular craze to demonstrate Ecclesiastes 4:12: ‘A cord of three strands is not quickly
broken’. Make loom bracelets using at least three colours. Reasonably priced loom band kits
are easy to obtain and come with instructions of how to make bracelets or other items such as
key fobs.
In addition copies of the Bible text in bookmark form or to colour in could be given to each
participant.
You will need: Loom band kit, copies of Bible text.
Talk about: Who the three different colours in the bracelet might represent (eg, yourself, God and
other people).
3. Little World’s Discs
Provide six circles of card for each person in the group. The first circle should be about 6cm in
diameter and then each circle should increase in size until the largest is about the size of a tea
plate.
The discs should be decorated with drawings, photos or cut-out pictures as follows:
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Disc 1 Me and my house
Disc 2 My street
Disc 3 My town
Disc 4 Our county
Disc 5 Our country
Disc 6 Our planet world
When completed, link them together with a ribbon or butterfly pin.
You will need: A variety of card circles in a range of colours, butterfly pins or ribbons, scissors,
drawing materials, magazine pictures or photos, glue.
It would also be helpful to have maps and globes in this area to look at.
Talk about: The different communities that we belong to and what it means to love our neighbour
as ourselves.
4. Aeroplane savings banks
Make aeroplane piggy banks out of plastic bottles. For instructions and a visual image for this
idea see https://brightnest.com/posts/for-kids-make-a-unique-piggy-bank-out-of-a-plasticbottle.
You will need: Plastic bottles complete with bottle top, paper, glue and scissors.
Talk about: The things we save up for. Talk about how in some of the poorest parts of the world
groups of people come together to save small amounts of money every week, which they put
into a fund. When they meet, those who have never been to school can learn to read and write
so that when they go to the shops they are no longer cheated since they now know how to count
their money. They also learn new skills about buying and selling and healthcare, and about laws
that protect them from being taken advantage of by other people.
With the money they receive from their joint savings and with the knowledge they have gained,
they can then go on to start their own businesses, such as owning a market stall or making
clothes. The people are saving together to lift each other up.
Have copies of the Together We Rise flyer available at this station.
5. Prayer Cubes
Each person has a prayer cube. Before making the cube, they write a prayer on each section:
1. ‘Thank you God that you love me.’
2. ‘Thank you God for the people in my... (family, school, church, community).’
3. ‘Help us to share what we have with others.’
4. ‘Help us to live together, share together and grow together.’
5. ‘Sorry for the times when we have forgotten the needs of other people.’
6. ‘May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit
be with us all. Amen.’
You will need: Copies of prayer cube template (see the end of this document) printed on thin
card for each person.
Talk about: Say that we will use these prayer cubes later in our prayer time.
Celebration
Songs: ‘Let us go out into the world with love in our hearts’
‘We are marching in the light of God’
‘Shake a friend’s hand’
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Teaching
Write out the first part of Jesus’ command from Matthew 22:37 on blue cards and hide them
around the room. Write out the second part on red cards and hide them around the room.
Divide the group into a red team and blue team and send them off to search for the cards.
Love the Lord
your God
with all your
heart
and with all
your soul
and with all
your mind
Love
your
neighbour
as
yourself
When they have been found, read the whole verse out. By putting these two commandments
together, Jesus was teaching us that these two commands stand together. You can’t have one
without the other. Get everyone to try and stand only on one foot. If we only loved God but don’t
love people, it would be like trying to go through life standing on only one foot. When you stand
on just one foot you begin to feel wobbly and it is hard to stay balanced. Standing on both feet
restores your balance and helps you to stand strong.
Prayer Time
Get into small groups and use the prayer cubes made earlier to help everyone take part in the
prayer time.
Food
Why not have a selection of food from around the world to demonstrate how we are dependent
upon one another for our food? Make menus which list where all the ingredients have come from.
Take-away activities to do at home
A ‘take-home’ activity could be to do a family fundraiser:
¶¶ Use the aeroplane saving banks to save up spare change to donate.
¶¶ Make more loom band bracelets and sell them to your friends.
Some child-focused activities could be:
¶¶ Using the grocery resources at the toddler group: see if the children can sort them into
colours or fruit and veg types – they could be sponsored a penny or 5p per correct sort. You
can be really flexible with this – they can still get the penny or 5p even if they get it wrong.
¶¶ A playdough or real cookie cut – how many cookies can the children cut in two minutes?
They could be sponsored 5p per cookie. Then, if using real cookie dough, cook the biscuits
and sell them to the rest of the church.
¶¶ A sponsored obstacle course where all the children are joined together, or where or two or
three go round together with the aim of holding hands the whole time.
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Dove Template
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Blank Cube Template
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