Recently we’ve changed our Kid’s Church on Sunday mornings and separated kindergarten from the rest of the grades. We realized they were feeling “lost” during the large group lesson for a couple of reasons. First, they can’t read, which makes the lesson and scripture reading a bit challenging. Second, they’re used to playing, making a craft and eating a snack and we don’t do much of that in Kid’s Church. We decided to keep kindergarten with the rest of the grades until we get to the actual lesson time. Then they go into a separate area for their lesson time. Here they get more age appropriate Bible teaching. In fact, we’re using my preschool lessons as the curriculum. The nice thing with this age is we can make the games/activities a little more challenging and have a deeper discussion about the story.

This week I had to write a new lesson and I’m excited to share it with you. This lesson is called “Jesus Chose Special Helpers”. It’s formatted like the rest of my preschool Bible lessons and I include all printables at the bottom of the post. Let me know if you use it and how it works for your group! I love feedback! (post contains affiliate links)

Welcome

Welcome children and introduce or remind them of Bible story time rules.

Opening Song

Jesus Wants us to be Friends

Prayer

Bible Story (Matthew 4:18-22)

Visual: a fishing net

You can read the paraphrase below or read from the Jesus Storybook Bible, pages 210-213.

• • I have a wonderful story to share with you today! How many of you like to fish? I love to fish! I love sitting in a boat and watching the bobber to see if it goes under. In our story today we hear about some fisherman and our favorite guy, Jesus.
  • Jesus was walking beside this big sea when we saw two brothers, Peter & Andrew. They were fishing, but not with a fishing pole, with a big net like this one (show fishing net). Jesus stopped and saw what they were doing. He said, “Hey, come follow me and I’ll send you to fish for people.”
  • Now you and I might think fishing for people is kind of weird, but not Peter and Andrew, they got right up and followed Jesus. They even left their nets!
  • Jesus kept walking, now with his new helpers, and saw two other brothers, James and John. They were in a boat with their dad getting their nets ready to fish. Jesus asked them to fish for people too and they left their boat, nets and their own dad to follow Jesus.
  • Jesus got 12 helpers total, he called them his disciples. But were they really fishing for people? No, they were going to help Jesus with his big rescue plan! He was the Messiah, sent by God to save the people from their sins. He was going to use his helpers to get the word out and show people He was really God’s son.
  • Did you know we can be Jesus’ helpers too? We can help tell others about Jesus, that He is God’s son and that He loved us so much he died on a cross for the sins of the whole world! Close your eyes and I want you to think of one way you can be a helper to Jesus.
  • Close in prayer.

Memory Verse

Matthew 4:19 “Come, follow me.”

Closing Songs

Jesus Loves Me

Story Reinforcers

Follow the Leader: Choose one child to be the “leader”. Instruct the children that whatever the leader does, the rest of the group must follow. If the leader jumps and claps, the followers jump and clap. Play the game and allow each child to be the leader. At the end, talk about how the disciples followed Jesus and they wanted to do everything he did. We should want to be just like Jesus as well.

Catch the Fish Game: Take your fishing net from the lesson and lay it in the middle of the room. Using the printable, spread paper fish around the room. Each fish is numbered 1-12. Just like an egg hunt, have children search the room and return the fish to the net. If you play the game more than once, choose a child to hide the fish each time.

Beaded Fish: Using pipe cleaners allow children to string pony beads onto the fish however they choose. As they do this, go over the story again and talk about how Jesus’ helpers were first fisherman, but Jesus called them to fish for people instead of real fish. Help children bend the pipe cleaners into a fish shape. Then attach the memory verse to the fish, “Come, follow me” Matthew 4:19 with tape.

Printable Resources

Printable Jesus Chose Special Helpers

Catch the Fish Game

Verse for Beaded Fish

Thanks for letting me share,