Children’s Sermon

John 1:6-8, 19-28

The Real Thing

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John 1:6-8, 19-28

The Real Thing

By Richard Niell Donovan

OBJECTS SUGGESTED:

Advertisements for toys––preferably color ads from a newspaper insert.

There’s a special day coming. Can anyone tell me what it is?

That’s right. Christmas is coming. Are you looking forward to Christmas?

At Christmas, you will probably get some presents. I brought some ads for toys. Look, here’s a (name a toy while point to its picture)––and here’s a (name another toy while pointing to its picture).

Let me ask you a question. Would you rather have a picture of a toy, which is what we have here––or would you rather have the toy itself?

Of course you would like to have the toy itself. Pictures like this are no substitute for the real thing are they!

In our Gospel lesson today, there is a man named John. He was a great man. Some people thought he might be the Messiah––the savior of the world.

But when they asked him who he was, he said he was NOT the Messiah. His job was to point them to the Messiah––just like these pictures of toys remind us of the toys themselves.

John’s job was to point people to the Messiah. That’s our job as Christians too. Can anyone tell me who the Messiah is?

That’s right. The Messiah is Jesus. Jesus loves us, doesn’t he! And he came to save us. Jesus is the real thing––the real Messiah––our real savior. And that’s the real message of Christmas.

Scripture quotations from the World English Bible