Materials
Use a stalk of celery, freshly cut on one end. Place it in a glass half full of grape juice or red-dyed water. Note that the celery will soak up the color through it’s stem, thus changing the color of the celery. You can use several sticks of celery and place them in various colors of dyed water. If you use food coloring then the stick will still be edible for a snack but be in unusual colors. You can even make black or brown that could represent drawing from a bad source.

Discussion
What determines what the celery will be like?
The plant, the roots of the plant, water, sun, circumstances, and drawing from the source what it needs all determine what the celery will be like. In the same way, the source from which we fulfill our needs, the Living Water in our lives, the SON, and circumstances all affect what we are like. How consistently we draw from our Source (abide) also affects us. (See John 15)

MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”
200 page e-book that explains everything you need to know when planning your very own object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed object lesson ideas and another 200 object lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms and Names / Descriptions of God.
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Materials
Place a bowl of seedless grapes in the middle of the room. There should be enough grapes for everyone to have one. You may have additional grapes to be used as a snack.

Activity
Ask everyone to sit in a circle around the bowl. Have each person to look into the bowl and choose a grape, remove it from the bowl, and study it carefully.
* How did this grape grow?
* What is the purpose of this grape?
* What determines a bad grape from a good grape?
Have everyone return their grapes to a different bowl. (These might not be edible again after they touch them and possibly mangle them) Mix up the grapes and see if the youth can find their original grapes.
* Are you sure it is the same grape?
* How can you tell?
* What special marking or color does your grape have?
* Who has the best grape? Why?
* In what ways are we like these grapes?

Debrief
Like the grapes, no two of us are alike, but we all have the same purpose in life: To abide and reproduce. What determines a good or bad grape is what lies beneath the skin. The skin doesn’t matter. A grape may be nutritious, good, tasty, sweet, sour, rotten, worm eaten, hard or soft. People may have sour personalities, rotten, eaten inside by sin, hard hearts or soft hearts. Other people may be sweet, good, a delight to be around, and beneficial to others.

Application
The vine, the roots of the vine, water, sun, circumstances, and drawing from the vine what it needs all determine what the grape will be like. In the same way, the source from which we fulfill our needs, the Living Water in our lives, the SON, and circumstances all affect what we are like. How consistently we draw from our Source (abide) also affects us. Circumstances and sin may cause us to be bruised or if it becomes sin becomes the primary characteristic of who we are we become rotten or sour. (See John 15)

MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”
200 page e-book that explains everything you need to know when planning your very own object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed object lesson ideas and another 200 object lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms and Names / Descriptions of God.
Learn More…

Preparation
Select a location where there are several large trees growing. You might also need a ground sheet students can lie on. You’ll need several Bibles.

Activity
Take your group to the selected trees. Form groups of no more than five and have each group select a tree. Have kids lie under the trees, looking up at the branches. Have a volunteer in each group read John 15:5-10, then have kids answer questions about themselves and their trees in their groups.

Debrief
1. Imagine this tree is a picture of Christ and his followers.
* Which part of the tree would you label as Christ? Explain.
* Which part would be his followers? Why?
2. Have kids look for branches that are dead and need pruning.
* Why do branches die?
* How might someone become spiritually dead, like a dead branch?
3. Look for new growth.
* In what ways have you experienced new growth spiritually?
4. Look for evidence that the tree is reproducing, such as seeds or fruit.
* What areas of your Christian life are producing fruit?

Additional Activity
Have each person choose a branch that is most like him or her spiritually and explain why they’ve chosen this branch. For example, someone might say, “This branch is like me because it has lots of new growth, and I’ve been growing a lot in my faith recently.”

Application
Close by having groups each form a circle around their tree and pray that they’ll grow in Christ, the true vine.

MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”
200 page e-book that explains everything you need to know when planning your very own object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed object lesson ideas and another 200 object lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms and Names / Descriptions of God.
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Materials
1 cm diameter and 6+ cm length of copper tubing or copper pipe, a couple sheets of ordinary paper cut to a length slight short than the copper pipe, cigarette lighter, matches, or a lit candle.

Activity
This is a simple demonstration from physics in that some materials conduct heat more efficiently than others. Take a strip of paper and place it in a flame. Within seconds it will catch fire and burn. Yet wrap an identical piece of paper tightly around a length of copper tubing or copper pipe and you can place it in the flame indefinitely without it catching fire. This is because copper is a better conductor of heat than paper and the copper tube dissipates the heat so that it never reaches the combustion point. (The easiest way to do this is to cut 4 or 5 cm wide strips from a piece of a4 size paper. Place the copper pipe in the middle of the strip of paper then hold the two ends of the paper together so that it grasps the pipe)

Application
When we are on our own and placed over the fire we are toast! We can’t take the heat. But when our lives are wrapped tightly around God he takes the heat for us. God helps us deal with the difficult times in life by taking the heat off of us.

MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”
200 page e-book that explains everything you need to know when planning your very own object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed object lesson ideas and another 200 object lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms and Names / Descriptions of God.
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Materials
Electrical appliances and other items which are useless without power

Activity
Demonstrate various electric tools and appliances without plugging them in:
1. Use your electric screw driver to turn a screw.
2. Mix a drink with a spoon using your blender.
3. Sit in front of a fan that is off, fanning yourself with your hand.
4. Sharpen your pencil by hand in an electric pencil sharpener.
ADD YOUR OWN IDEAS

Discussion
Explain to the children how useful these tools are. Of course someone will speak up and tell you why they are not working too well.
These things were all created to work under electrical power.

Application
In the same way we were all created to work under God’s power. While we were each created with a purpose, only through God’s strength can we be fully effective and do all the things God created us to do.
2 Corinthians 4:7

In this object lesson, children and youth are reminded that God created us with a special purpose, but that purpose can only be accomplished when we rely on his power rather than our own.

MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”
200 page e-book that explains everything you need to know when planning your very own object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed object lesson ideas and another 200 object lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms and Names / Descriptions of God.
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Materials
Construction paper (assorted colours). Stickers of animals, plants and stars. Glue.

Activity
Use one sheet of construction paper for each of the seven days of creation and add one extra sheet with a cross, 8 sheets in all.
Day 1. On the first page, paste a large black circle with a semicircle of yellow covering half of it. Over this, we paste a large number 1. This represents the first day of creation. God created light.
Day 2. For the next page, place a second circle of dark blue and a semi-circle of light blue over it, dividing it into a top and bottom half. Then paste a large number 2. God divided the waters.
Day 3. The third day was dry land, and then vegetation. So divide another circle into blue and brown. On the brown half, stick stickers of grass, flowers, trees, vegetables, etc. Then a large number 3.
Day 4. Day four was the planets and stars, so use a solid black circle with a yellow number four. Place stickers of stars, suns, moon, comets, etc. all around the circle.
Day 5. For day five use a dark blue bottom half and a light blue top half of a circle, the number 5 and stickers of birds and fish in the appropriate places.
Day 6. For day six, we use a whole green circle and glue on stickers of all the different kinds of animals. Then add stickers of people or children to the circle and the number 6.
Day 7. For day seven, use one circle of a glittery, rainbow-colored paper and a large number 7. And then write “on the 7th day, God rested”.
Final Page For the eighth peice of paper, add a cross representing Christ, add a construction paper cover and simply write on the front “In the beginning…”. Use this to explain Creation

Application
Scripture tells us that Jesus was present and involved in creation itself. But Jesus not only created us but redeems us. Colossians 1:15-20

Use this booklet to illustrate the days of creation and remind them that Christ was involved in Creation

MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”
200 page e-book that explains everything you need to know when planning your very own object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed object lesson ideas and another 200 object lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms and Names / Descriptions of God.
Learn More…