Use this children’s Sunday School lesson to show kids how Jesus rescues us from Satan’s power.
Needed: Bibles, a variety of items
Intro Game: Sneaky Stealing!
Place a variety of items in the center of your play area. Then, divide the kids into two teams. One team will spread out in your play area and pretend to be sleeping. With their eyes closed, they’ll listen for the other team coming to sneak up on them. If they hear any movement, they raise the alarm and chase and tag the opposite team members. Then, the two teams switch roles.
If the sneaking team makes it to the center of the play area and picks up the items, they win. Then, the two teams switch roles.
Each team can choose to leave some of their members behind to give fewer members a better chance at sneaking.
Play as long as time permits.
Lesson
Read Matthew 12:29.
“Or again, how can anyone enter a strong man’s house and carry off his possessions unless he first ties up the strong man? Then he can plunder his house.”
I want you all to close your eyes and imagine the story I’m about to tell you. There is a man, sitting in his house late at night. He has lots of nice things in his house and is sitting in his chair, looking at all of those nice things. But then, all of a sudden, a very strong man, much stronger than the man in the house, breaks through the door. The strong man fights with the man in the house and beats him. He ties him up in the chair and then, the strong man takes all of the man’s nice things.
You can open your eyes for a second. Who do you think the good guy was in that story, the man who was sitting in his house, or the strong man who came in, tied up the other man, and then, took all of his things?
Usually, we would say that the man in his house was the good guy, and the strong man who tied up the man and took his things was the bad guy.
But now, close your eyes and listen to the story again.
There is a man, sitting in his house late at night. He has lots of nice things in his house because he stole them, and now, he is sitting in his chair, looking at all of those nice things that he stole. But then, all of a sudden, a very strong man, much stronger than the man in the house, breaks through the door. The strong man fights with the man in the house and beats him. He ties him up in the chair and then, the strong man takes all of the man’s nice things that he stole and returns them to their owner.
Now, who is the good guy in the story and who is the bad guy?
The bad guy is the one who stole the things, and the good guy is the one who came to take the things back to their owner.
Now, close your eyes and listen to the story one more time.
There is a man, sitting in his house late at night. The man is Satan, or the devil, and his house is the whole world. He has lots of nice things in his house, and he’s sitting in his chair, looking at all of them. The nice things that he has, though, are people. He’s kidnapped all of the people from God by making them do bad things and turn against God. But then, all of a sudden, a very strong man, much stronger than the man in the house, breaks through the door. The strong man is Jesus. Jesus fights with the devil and beats him. He ties him up in the chair and then, the strong man, Jesus, saves all of the people that the devil had kidnapped, and brings them back to God.
Now, who is the good guy, the strong man, Jesus, or the man in the house, the devil?
Jesus is the good guy because He beats the devil and saves us all from him.
Satan wants to steal us from God by making us do bad things and not believe in God. But Jesus came to rescue us from Satan.
The great thing is that Jesus is always stronger than Satan, and Jesus can always save us from him.
Game: Freeing the Prisoner
Divide the students into two teams on opposite sides of your play area. A line divides the play area. A Prisoner from each team goes to stand on the play area’s boundary, behind the opposite team. They are in the opposite team’s prison. The rest of the team then tries to reach their Prisoner without being tagged.
The opposing team can tag them anytime they cross the middle line into their territory. The strategy is for the teams to send some of their members to free their Prisoner while leaving others behind to tag members of the opposite team trying to cross over to free the Prisoner they’re guarding. When a player crosses the line and gets tagged by a defending team member, they’re out. The game is over when one team reaches and frees their Prisoner.
Remind students that Jesus rescues us from Satan.
Game: Sneaky Stealing
Play the intro game again. Remind students that Jesus is the strong man who takes us back from Satan.
Closing Prayer
Jesus, we thank You for coming to find us when Satan had us as prisoners. We pray that You’ll help us always to do the right things and believe in God so that Satan can’t capture us again. Amen.
You can also find this lesson for Kindle or in print in my book, The Parables and Teachings of Jesus Vol. 1.