This children’s sermon was given October 4, during our global pandemic, so it was experienced virtually rather than by children in the sanctuary. It uses language from a Godly Play lesson by Jerome Berryman on the good shepherd and World Communion Sunday. I’m posting it here in hopes that it can be helpful to someone.
Good morning, girls and boys! I’m so glad you’re here with us today.
This is a special day in churches all over the world. Do you know what is special about today? If you. don’t know, you might figure it out with what I brought to share today. It’s a story we share in Godly Play and this is how it starts…
There was once someone who did such wonderful things and said such amazing things that people wondered who he was.
Finally, they just had to ask him. And he said, “I am the Good Shepherd. I know each one of my sheep by name and they know the sound of my voice. When I take them sheep from the sheepfold they follow me. I walk in front to show them the way. I show them the way to the good grass. We all gather there.
This is the table of the good shepherd.
Here is the bread and the wine of the good shepherd.
Sometimes someone comes to the table, someone like Pastor Camille, and they read or say the words of the Good Shepherd and to give us the bread and the wine.
Sometimes the people of the whole world come to the table. And even the children come.
We come together and we remember the Good Shepherd. And the Good Shepherd is there with us too.
I wonder if you know what’s special about today? It’s World Communion Sunday.
I wonder if you’ve ever come close to this table, if you’ve ever come close to the bread and the wine. You know, not all families with kids do communion the same way. In some families, the tradition is for children to wait to have communion until they’ve been baptized. That’s a good choice.
In other families, parents choose for children to have communion as soon as they want to. That’s a good choice, too.
Everyone is welcome at God’s table, whether you wait to eat and drink or not. You can still remember Jesus, and Jesus will be with you, whatever your family chooses.
I like that the word communion means what it sounds like. Come! Union! Communion! Be together, with God.
Let’s pray.
Dear God, thank you for communion and for the Good Shepherd who leads us there. We love you, God. Amen.