What Will You Say?

Material

• Puppet in which you can insert your hand and move the puppet’s mouth.

Steps

1. Ask the children: Have you seen my puppet? When I put my hand in the puppet, I can move it. Then I can put words in his mouth by moving my mouth in certain ways while I’m talking. It means I can get the puppet to say what I want it to say! It’s more interesting not to be a puppet and to be able to say the words we choose. You, what would you say? We have the choice to speak with our own words, but we can also choose to pronounce the words of God. We can ask God what he wants us to say, and as a puppet says our words, we can say God’s words. A puppet cannot choose his words, but we can choose to say the words of God. We can ask him to fill our mouths with the words he wants us to say.
2. Make the connection with the story of the day. Jeremiah was a prophet. Do you know what a prophet is? A prophet is a messenger of God. Jeremiah listened to God and then uttered the words God gave him for the people. Even when it wasn’t what people wanted to hear, Jeremiah always spoke. Jeremiah was thrown into a well and a prison cell [Jeremiah 37-38], and yet he chose to tell the truth that God had given him to tell.