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Choose from the following Children's Sermons:

• The Upside-Down Kingdom, Mark 9:3--37
  by Rev. Frank Schaefer (see below)
   

• "Can salt lose its saltiness?" Mark 9:30-37 
  Roberta in Quebec  (scroll down)
   

• Christians Serve Others, Mark 9:3--37,
  by Rev. Frank Schaefer (scroll down)

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The Upside-Down Kingdom
a children's sermon seed based on Mark 9:3--37
by Rev. Frank Schaefer

props: children's book "The Topsy-Turvies" by Francesca Simon (illustrated by Karen Ludlow).

Show a few "scenes" from the book. In this story everything is reversed: the family gets up at midnight and sleeps during the day, in school, the children are the teachers, the parents are students, the kids must eat the cake before they may enjoy dinner, etc.

Proceed to compare this story to Jesus' idea of the "upside-down kingdom." "Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all."  In God's kingdom, those who are important are those who are serving others, those who society considers insignificant are VIPs too!  And in Jesus' kingdom, children are very important too.  In our bible lesson Jesus said: whoever welcomes a child welcomes Jesus himself."

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"Can salt lose its saltiness?"
Mark 9:30-37 
Roberta in Quebec

(1) Jar of warm water. A box of salt. You can see the salt. You can see the water. What happens when you put the salt into the water and shake it up? Most of the salt dissolves. Is the salt still there? We can’t see it. Can we taste it? (The kids taste the water.) The salt is still there even though we can’t see it. Jesus ask, “If salt has lost its saltiness hoe can we season it?” Salt doesn’t actually lose its saltiness at all. But it be watered down. Our faith like that—we can water it down by not following the ways of Jesus, but the spirit of Christ lives in our hearts always. What are some of the ways that we water down our salty faith? (Ideas: by being unkind, by not talking to God or our friends when we are upset with God about something or upset with our parents...)

(2) A couple of more facts about salt. Did you know that there are four ounces of salt in our bodies? We can't live without it. Without salt, our muscles won't contract, our blood won't circulate...we cannot live without salt. Something else about salt. It’s much easier to swim in the ocean than in a lake. Do you know why? Because salt makes things float. Our faith works like the salt in the water. It holds us up when things get tough or we have bad experiences. We may have the salt of faith in our hearts, but that doesn't mean that bad things won’t happen. It means that our faith will help us get through the sad and difficult times, so we won't drown in our troubles. Our faith keeps us strong.

Let us pray together. THANK YOU GOD FOR BEING LIKE SALT. WE CANNOT LIVE WITHOUT SALT IN OUR BODIES, AND WE CANNOT LIVE WITHOUT YOU. YOU BLESS US WITH FRIENDS, FAMILY AND FUN. THANK YOU IN THE NAME OF JESUS. AMEN.

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Christians Serve Others
a children's sermon seed on Christian service
by Rev. Frank Schaefer

Props: a stole from your vestment or any other symbol of Christian service

Gather the children, and show them your stole (or other symbol), symbol of servanthood, that you're wearing.   You may tell them about how your stole (or symbol) was presented to you on your day of ordination (or lay ministry / deacon's dedication) as a symbol for your charge to serve the people of God.  Tell the children about Christians as servants, people touched by God's grace and forgiveness called to serve God and others.

Refer to the Gospel lesson in which Jesus said that the greatest in kingdom of heaven is everybody's servant.

Name some examples of how you as a pastor (or lay minister) serve in your congregation.    Ask them what they feel they could do to serve God and others in church and beyond the church walls.

Praise them for the acts of service they are already doing and encourage them to think of more ways to serve God and others.  Share from your own experience how service can be rewarding, how it can make you feel very good on the inside, etc.  Close with a prayer asking God to help us be better servants.