Introduction
Use wheat kernels and a chessboard to teach the idea of a little faith growing into something very big.

Materials Needed
Wheat kernels. If you can’t find wheat, sunflower seeds, peas, or just about any other seeds will substitute. The volume would still be significant.
A checkerboard or chess board

Description
Seeds and doubling or used to show how faith, though it starts out small can grow to be very large.

Preparation
Set up a checker board with grains of wheat according to the story

What to Do
With the checkerboard on display ith the grains of wheat, tell the children this story:
Some time ago there was a display at the museum of Science and industry in Chicago. It featured a checkerboard with 1 grain of wheat on the first square, 2 on the second, 4 on the third, and 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, etc. A few squares down the board there were so many grains of wheat they couldn’t fit on one square. Above the display was this question: “At this rate of doubling every square, how much grain would you have on the checkerboard by the time you reached the 64th square?”

Ask children how much grain they think that would be?

After they provide a few ideas, give them the answer: “Enough grain to cover the entire subcontinent of
India 50 feet deep.”

Application
Our faith may start out small, but as God uses it, the end result can be very large! The boy’s small lunch offered to Jesus fed a Multitude. Elijah use a small jar of flour and oil to feel a woman and her son through a famine. David, a small boy, was used by God to defeat a giant. The Bible is full of stories in which God used a little faith in Him to do great things!

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