This gathering activity works well in combination with the “Family (Intercessions)” activity but would also work as a stand alone resource.
Resources Needed:
- A membership card (doesn’t matter where the card is for)
- Script
Script:
How many of you have a membership card with you, perhaps in your purse or wallet? If you have one then get it out for a minute and hold it up.
Would any of you like to tell us what your membership card is for? [Ask a few people around the room]
Membership cards are great, we can use them to access clubs, shops or events that wouldn’t be open to us without the card; they offer us the chance to meet like minded people, get the VIP treatment or special offers.
But how would you feel if this morning I told you that anyone who didn’t have a membership card wouldn’t be allowed in? Or if I told you that anyone who had done anything wrong this week had broken the terms of their membership card and would have to go home? I think we might be pretty thin on the ground if we did that.
The good news this morning is that the church isn’t a membership club – it is a family.
There is no need to feel that you have to know all the right things or be perfect in following all of the rules – God knows that all of us have made mistakes and done things that hurt him, others or ourselves but he invites us to join him in his family, 100% forgiven and accepted!
[Finish with a short prayer thanking God for inviting us into his family and asking for his forgiveness for the things we have done wrong]