Purpose: Use this children’s sermon on Abraham and Isaac to teach kids how to put God first in their lives.
Scripture: Genesis 22:1-19
Needed: an assortment of differently-sized building blocks or pieces of wood
Children’s Sermon
Show students your building materials and tell them that you want their help to build a tower. You’ll build it, but you want them to tell you which block to add next.
Most groups choose to put the largest block as the foundation. If you’re group doesn’t, don’t worry; the illustration will still work.
When you’re and the students are finished building the tower, ask, Why did you choose to put this one (whichever is block is on the bottom) first? (If it’s the largest block, you can talk about how it provides a stable foundation for the rest of the tower.)
Abraham once had to make a very difficult decision not about what he was going to put first in his tower, but about what he was going to put first in his life.
When Abraham finally had a son when he was 100 years old, God told him to take that son, Isaac, up a mountain and kill him as a sacrifice to God.
That sounds like a scary situation, doesn’t it? Do you think you would do something like that if God you to?
The Bible tells us that Abraham thought that if he did kill Isaac, God would bring him back from the dead ( Hebrews 11:19 ). But he couldn’t be sure. He only knew that he had to do what God told him. He had to put God first in his life.
So, Abraham took Isaac up that mountain and he tied him to a big rock and he raised his knife to kill his son. And then God called to Abraham.
(Read Genesis 22:12 , quoted here in the NIV.) “‘Do not lay a hand on the boy,’ He said. ‘Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from Me your son, your only son.”
Abraham put God first, and it all worked out, didn’t it? He didn’t have to sacrifice Isaac, after all. It was just a test from God to see if Abraham would listen to Him or not.
Things work out for us, too, when we put God first in our lives. God never tells us to do something wrong and He always helps everything else go right, just like our first block helped us build our tower.
When we listen to God and do what He wants us to, He makes it easier to get along with our family and friends. He makes it easier for us to stay out of trouble. He even makes it easier for us to be happy in our lives.
God told Abraham and He tells us to put God first in our lives because He knows that it’s good for us to listen to Him.
Closing Prayer
Father, we thank You that You are a good God who always helps us. We ask You now to help us to put You first in our lives so that You can make everything else go better too. In Jesus’ name we pray, amen.
You can also find this children’s sermon for Kindle or in print in my book, The People Build a Tower, but God Builds a Family