sensory faith

Silver Coin Treasure Hunt

sensory faith

This is a treasure hunt for the hidden silver that Judas was given for betraying Jesus.

To play this game you will need 30 silver coins. You can use 30x 5cent or 10cent pieces or you might like to try out these variations below for making your own.

Make Your Own Coins
You can buy the silver wrapped chocolate coins usually in party stores ot make your own using 30 round sweets wrapped in aluminium foil. A freckle or large choc bud is sized about right for a coin!

Once you have your 30 coins, pick a room or a spot outside and hide them, and send someone off to go and find them.

optional
To add something a little extra tricky you could make this into a scavenger hunt, a treasure hunt with clues or even do it as a blindfolded walk with only the directions spoken to you to find them.

Remember the Light Lantern

sensory faith
Remembering the Light

You will need:
Empty, clean glass jar
PVA glue
Water
Paint brush
Tissue paper

How to Make It:
Cut some of your tissue paper into small squares. (A little goes a long way!)
In a glass add some PVA and a little water to thin it out.
Using the Brush, cover a section of the jar with the glue, then add pieces of tissue paper however you like!
Keep brushing a section and adding tissue paper until the jar is covered.
Once the jar is covered, brush a final layer of the PVA onto the jar ensuring that all edges of the tissue paper have been stuck down.
Place the jar somewhere to dry.
Once dry, add a tealight or battery operated tealight candle.
Now wait for it to get dark so you can see how beautiful the glow is!

If you don’t have a glass jar, check out this alternative from Flame Creative Children’s Ministry

Holy Monday

lectionary, sensory faith, worship resources

Welcome to Monday in Holy Week. This week as we explore the readings of Holy Week through our senses today’s reading for us is from John’s gospel (RCL yr A) and can be found here. It is the story of a woman’s extravagant love for Jesus in sharing something so precious and expensive with him. It is a reminder of the way in which we are invited to love God and others, with a generous and unbound love.

In John 12:1-7, at a meal given in Jesus’ honor, Mary expressed her devotion to the Lord by breaking open an expensive jar of fragrant oil, anointing Jesus’ feet with it, and wiping them with her hair. Some present objected, but Jesus defended Mary for her actions. Our sense of smell is a very powerful thing in helping us to feel comforted, disgusted or even a bit ill. Jesus accepts Mary’s offering as it fills his senses.

Thinking About This

Take a few moments to think about this story today using the prompts below. Write about it for yourself or share a conversation with someone you love.

What is your favourite smell in the whole wide world?
What is one thing you absolutely can’t stand the smell of?
What is a smell that brings to mind a special memory?

What is the most precious thing you own?
Have you ever love someone so much that you were willing to give up your previous item for them?

How do you think Mary was feeling? How about Jesus?
How about Judas? Have a think about the way he responded to Mary’s offering.
What about the others gathered there, have a think about how they might be feeling. Pretend you are one of them present and write, draw or talk about your response.

How can we be generous with our love towards others just like Mary was towards Jesus?

How might you show your love for God today?

Embodying This Story

Watch the story here from LifeKids.

Using your senses see if you can beat the challenge of What is that smell?

Other great resources: jigsaw puzzle, code words, spot the difference, word search, colouring pages

For something extra, you can look here for ideas on how we tell God how much we love God through prayers of praise and adoration.


What is that smell!

sensory faith


Our sense of smell is a very powerful thing. There is a story in the Bible which speaks of a woman’s devotion to Jesus by sharing a gift with him that had the most amazing smell. John 12: 1-7 tells the story of Mary of Bethany who anoints Jesus feet with some precious oil she had been keeping. You can read the story in full here.

Why not embody this story and test out your own sense of smell. Grab a friend or family member and have a go at the activity below. See how good your nose is.

You will need:
6 glasses
items from your pantry or fridge, you pick! Pick items that will have a strong smell
Cotton balls
A friend
A blind fold
A teatowel

How to play:
Pick your six smells from your pantry and place a small portion into each glass, so you have one smell in one cup. If you are using liquids you might like to put a cotton ball in the glass to soak up the smell and save on spilling chances!
Cover your glasses with a tea towel and go and grab your friend.
Once they are back at the smelling table, blindfold them. When the blindfold is secured well, offer them the glasses one at a time and ask them to take a good smell and see if they can figure out what they all are.

Have them swap so you can have a go, raid the pantry again and try with something different!

Hosanna Banner

lectionary, sensory faith, worship resources

When Jesus Rode into Jerusalem on a Donkey, the crowds were so excited to see him. He was their long expected king. The one who would free them from oppression. If I was in my congregation this weekend we would be celebrating with palm leaves, songs and dancing. Let’s not let the physical distancing of CV-19 change that. Let’s still celebrate, and here’s how we can do this together in our homes.

What you will need:

A print out of this palm leaf template.
8 A4 sheets green or white paper
Pencils, textas, crayons and maybe green paint
scissors
PVA glue
String/Wool
optional: green glitter

How To Make
Print & Cut out one copy of palm leaf template.
If you have green paper, fantastic! Use your template to cut enough to spell “Hosanna” and whatever you want on either side of it.
If you don’t have any green paper, print out 8 of the templates, and colour with green crayon, texta, pencil or paint!
If you have glitter, run a line of glue around the edges of each letter and apply glitter (maybe ask a big person to assist with this)
Once your leaves are dry, string them up to make your banner! Don’t forget to make sure all of your letters are in the right order. H-O-S-A-N-N-A-!

That’s it everybody! Now find somewhere to hang it so you can look at it and remember the story of Jesus riding into Jerusalem and the crowds that cheered for him.

Palm Sundaes

sensory faith

In our current times of physical distancing due to CV-19 here’s a fun and easy way to really get into the celebratory mood of Palm Sunday. Let’s make Palm Sunday “Sundaes”. I’ll be ensuring all of the families in my community have the resources ready for making these together on Sunday.

HERE’S WHAT YOU’LL NEED TO GET STARTED:
Ice Cream
You can’t have a sundae without it! I opted for plain vanilla, but really, I think you could choose any flavour.

Crushed Cookies
The crushed cookies symbolize the rough and rocky road that Jesus travelled on when coming in to Jerusalem.

Green Mint Leaves
You’ll want to find a mint leaves for this one. Alternatively, you could use green sour straws, jelly beans, green sprinkles, fruit roll ups, gummy worms, green raisins, pistachios etc.  You’ll pour this on top of the crushed road to represent the palm branches that were waved and spread across the road during Jesus’ arrival.

Miniature Kit Kat
This represents the donkey that Jesus rode on.

Sour Patch Kids
This represents Jesus. You can use whatever candy you want for this, but I thought it would be perfect since it is sort-of-human shaped. Gummy bears might also work and jelly babies would also work.

Sprinkles
This represents the joy and celebration of the crowd as the Messiah entered into Jerusalem.

Cool Whip
This is solely just for aesthetics. You can’t have ice cream without a little extra cream! Plus, it makes it so much easier to place Jesus, the donkey and the sprinkles.

All of these ingredients together don’t make the typical sundae, but children love to pile on the sweets when it comes to their ice cream, so I don’t think the fact that there are contrasting flavours going on will be a problem. I don’t particularly love sour gummies in my ice cream, but it makes for such a fun treat with a great message.

I am looking forward to sharing this treat with the family this year. I know they are going to get excited once they see me bring in the ice cream! While we’re creating our sundae, I’ll be sharing the story and symbolisms of this special day in a way they won’t soon forget.