Supplies and set up: 9 Post-It notes per team,
1/2" masking tape for indoors, or colored chalk for outdoors, 2
Ping-Pong balls, a straw for each player. Using your masking tape, or chalk,
make a course for each team. The courses should be about two feet wide
and 15 feet long. It can be straight, but it
is better to put some curves into it to make it more interesting! Write
Matthew 7:13-14 down on nine Post-it notes
per team as follows: #1) "Enter through the, #2) narrow gate, #3)
For wide is the gate, #4) and broad is the road, #5) that leads to
destruction, #6) and many enter through
it. #7) But small is the gate, #8) and narrow the road that leads to life, #9)
and only a few find it. Matthew 7:13-14.
Copy, or type on a separate sheet of paper, the following fill
in the blank worksheet; give one to each
team:
"Enter _________ the narrow _______. For ________ is the
gate and ___________ is the _______ that leads to ________ and many ________
__________ it. But ________ is the _______
and _________ the road that ________ to life, and ________ a few ________
it." Matthew ___________.
How To Play
First player on each team
places a Ping-Pong ball at the starting
point of his or her course. Players get on their hands and knees, and using
their straws, blow their Ping-Pong
balls to the end of their courses. When the players reach the end have
someone standing there to place the #1 Post-It note on the player's
back. When the player retrieves their Post-It note, they must turn
around and blow the Ping-Pong ball back to
start. The next player in line takes his or her turn until all the
Post-it notes, # 1-9 have been collected. As the players collect their
Post-It note clues, they fill in the
blanks on their worksheets. If the players blow their Ping-Pong ball off
course, they must go back to the
start position and try again. First team to finish is the winning team!
You can play this game using a
multitude of different verses. However, the point being made with ‘The
Narrow Way" game, is that it can be difficult at times to stay on the path.
Object Lesson
What would you do if you were taking a walk with a group
of your friends and one of them invited the rest of the group to come to her home? She said that she
knew of a perfect
path to get to her
house. The group begins to follow her until they realize that the
pathway they are on is very narrow,
rocky, and hard to travel. As a result, most of your friends turn
back. They say it is ridiculous to take
this narrow, rocky path, because they know of an easier, broad path
to travel. However, they don't realize that if they go the easier way,
they will not know how to get to the home of the friend that invited
them to come! So what good is the
easier path? The point I am making is this, Jesus said, "Enter
through the narrow gate. For
wide is the gate, and broad is the road, that leads to destruction, and
many enter through it. But small is
the gate, and narrow the road that leads to life and only a
few find it." (Matthew
7:13-14)
Our Savior and Forever
Friend, Jesus, wants us to know that going his way is not always the
easy way to get home to God. But it is the ONLY way to get there. Why
might people your age not want to follow the ways of God? (Allow for
discussion. i.e. peer pressure, embarrassment, temptation, never hearing
the Good News, etc.) Many people think that they
know how to get to God. They believe that if they are good enough, try hard
enough, have Christian parents, do enough good works, go to church, know
the right people, or say certain prayers, that these things will
get them to Heaven when they die. But Jesus
said, "I am the way and the
truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."
John 14:6. The Bible also says, "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this
not from yourselves, it is the gift of God--not by works, so that no one can boast."
Ephesians 2:8-9.
Jesus wants us to know that
it is not the things we do that makes our way to God in Heaven. It is
what he has done for us that makes our way. It may seem
narrow, and sometimes difficult, but Jesus has told us that he is the
only way home, and he will guide us there. Follow him!
