Our most recent kids’ hour theme has been “Set Your House in Order.” The inspiration for this theme was a sermon by Bro. Johnny Wade from several years ago. He talked about the house in our hearts and getting rid of the things that did not match. Bro. Johnny deals in what he calls junk. He finds these items and resells them. He has found things that he thought was neat, but his wife did not want them in their house. She did not think they matched.

Bro. Johnny told of a tenant who had to be evicted. The landlord of the apartment went up and down the stairs, hauling the unwanted things to the curb. Not once did he dig in this trash later! It didn’t belong in the apartment.

After God helps you to haul things to the curb, don’t go back through the items! They are not allowed back in your heart house!

We need to be particular what is in our heart house. Some furniture will just have to go!

Each Sunday night, we had a piece of furniture representing things to get rid of:

Day 1

-Chair of pride (We want to change it for the chair of humility.)

-Bible Story:  King Nebuchadnezzar

-Object Lesson/Game:  Two teams take turns stacking cups.  Whoever’s cup was on top by the end won.  If the stack fell on your turn, you were out.  Pride goes before a fall.

Day 2

-Couch of Criticism (We want to change it for a couch of compassion.)

-Bible Story: Adam and Eve

Day 3

-Lamp of Self-Righteousness (We want to change it for a lamp of holiness.)

-Bible Story:  Cain and Able

-Object Lesson/Game:  Cup of honey.  We drizzled honey in a cup and asked someone to get it all out with a butter knife/spoon.  Even if they get a lot out, there will still be traces of the honey.  We can’t save and clean ourselves by our own power.  

 Day 4

-Bed of Self-Pity (We want to change it for a bed of praise.)

-Bible Story:  Job

-Object Lesson/Game:  Building Houses.  We got enough Lincoln Logs/Legos to build a house with a door, windows, roof, etc.  We divided all the materials into little bags prior to the service.  All of the kids get one bag and are told to build a house.  They try but come short because they didn’t have enough materials.  Explain that if they all built together, they could build a nice home instead of trying to do it by themselves.  We need Christ’s help when “building” our lives.  We always come short if we try to do things by ourselves.

Day 5

-Table of Cares of This Life (Some things like hobbies aren’t necessarily bad, but they take up too much room in our house.  They take up time and energy we could give to God.)

-Bible Story:  Parable of the sower  

Day 6

-Trash or Treasure?

-Bible Story:  Pearl of Great Price

-Object Lesson/Game:  Holiday Trash.  Take a realistic-looking fake bill and crumple it up.  Slip it into a child’s hand.  Tell them not to look at it.  People try to exchange or persuade the child to give them what’s in his hand.  Offer him a real $1.  Later tell him to open his hand.  He realizes that he has been guarding fake money.  It has no value.  Jesus wants us to let go of the unimportant things or even wrong things like pride, criticism, and self-pity.  God has a treasure in store (heaven, relationship with Him, and peace). 

Abigail made furniture cut outs for the wall, but it would be neat to bring in actual furniture each week to talk about.

Final Craft/Snack:  Make a house out of pop tarts like a gingerbread/graham cracker house.

Let’s set our house in order!