Detectives of Divinity Easter 6 - John 15:13-17

Props: Detective gear, picture of sculpture of a heart, a picture of friends and/or a friendship bracelet, a couple of kinds of fruit.

·         Remind the children that when we don’t have Jesus with us, we need to look for clues about God in other places – today I’m looking at clues from something Jesus said

·         John 15 gives us clues about what our relationship to God is like

·         Put on detective gear and look at clues together:

o   the first clue: friendship bracelet and picture of friends – Ask the kids if they know what kind of bracelet this is?  Has anyone made one?  Jesus said that he doesn’t call us servants.  Instead he calls us friends.  Can you think of someone who is your friend?  You tell each other everything.  You love each other.  You spend lots of time together.  You pick your friends – it’s not like family where you have no choice.  Jesus chose us to be his friends.

o   the second clue: fruit – Jesus said that when he chose us, and when we become friends with him, we will bear fruit.  Do you think he means fruit like this apple?  Or this orange?  Do you remember the song you learned from Bryan about the fruit of the Spirit?  (sing) “The fruit of the spirit is love… joy…peace” (patience, kindness, generosity,faithfulness, gentleness, self-control)That is the kind of fruit that we can learn when we practice being friends with Jesus and with each other.

o   the third clue: heart – what do hearts usually mean?  LOVE.  One of the most important fruits of the Spirit is love.  If we keep choosing to be friends with each other, and with other people, we will keep practicing love.  And love isn’t always just a feeling, it’s doing all the hard things, like being patient, and kind and generous and faithful…all those other fruits that we sing about .  It’s a choice.  But even when we don’t do it so well, Jesus loves us so much and we can count on that always. 

·         This week’s clues are hard…it’s hard to know how to act, or be or what to do when Jesus isn’t right here telling us.  So, just like always we need to look to each other and count on our friends to help us.