Ordinary 17

26 July 2026

Bible readings for today

Genesis 29:15-28
Psalm 105:1-11,45
Psalm 128:1-6
Romans 8:26-39
Matthew 13:31-33,44-52

Liturgical Colour: GREEN

Collect

God of mercy,
you have blessed us beyond our dreams;
you have set before us promises and perils
beyond our understanding;
help us to struggle and pray
that the perils may be averted
and your promises fulfilled.
Hear this prayer for your love’s sake.
Amen.

E te Atua atawhai, kua manaakitia mātou e koe i tua atu i ō mātou moemoeā; kua whakatakotohia mai e koe ngā oati me ngā mate i tua atu i ō mātou mōhiotanga; āwhinatia mai mātou ki te whawhai me te īnoi hoki kia parea atu ngā mate kia tutuki ai ō oati. Whakarongo ki tēnei īnoi i runga i tōu aroha.
Āmine.

The Kingdom of Heaven (Matthew 13:31-33,44-52)

What is the Kingdom of Heaven like? In today's reading, Jesus gives four stories of what the Kingdom of God is like: a mustard seed, yeast, treasure in a field, and a net full of fish.

Questions

In Matthew 13 Jesus talks about what the Kingdom of Heaven is like.He uses many different images and there does not seem to be a clear answer.

Which image resonates with you the most and why?
What does it mean to you, when you hear or say "Your Kingdom come"?
What would you do if you found a hidden treasure?
Where is the Kingdom of Heaven?
What do you treasure in your life right now?
What is God’s greatest treasure?

Doodle through the Bible

A colourful doodle of today's Bible passage, from Doodle through the Bible.

You an download a full colour and Colouring Page

Intergenerational worship

Intergenerational material and ideas compiled by Rev Amanda Nicholas for Intergen.au

Treasure games

You will need:

A treasure box. You can use a decorated cardboard box, or a large tub/bin. You can decorate to make it look like a treasure box! (even if it just has a sign!)
Treasure, including:
- Pearls: large white balls. These could be made from paper, plastic or recycled polystyrene (we prefer recyclable materials!)
- Seeds: Large colourful balls, like the ones you find in a ball pit, or larger plastic balls.
- Yeast: small bread rolls, or pieces of bread. (old unused bread is fine!)
- Fish: You can use tins of tuna if you have some in the cupboard, or cardboard cut outs of fish
- Treasure: some pirate gold treasure, like the medallions and party things you can get at the $2 shop

How many props you need will depend on how many children you have attending your group. You might like multiple relay teams, and fill the treasure boxes with a few of each so that children get multiple opportunities to run to fetch one.

What you do:There are a few different ideas on how to play games using the treasure props

Line up the children in teams at one end of the room, and get them to run to the treasure box and bring back an item of treasure. You may like to explain what each one is, or you can use them as props in the story you tell -- getting the children to guess which prop is which bit of treasure.
Instead of doing a relay race, you could also hide these props around a hall and get the children to find them. You might like to remember where you leave any edible items!

Gospel Conversations

The Kingdom of God: How do we understand Jesus when he talks about it, especially when he does so through stories which may be open to so many interpretations? Bishop Kelvin (former bishop of Dunedin Diocese), Rev Peg Riley and Jonathan join Rev Michael Godfrey, and they have a few surprises for us as they approach some familiar parables in perhaps unfamiliar ways!

And some wonderful 'Gospel Conversations extra!" A bonus 3 minutes that bring some reflections of mustard, yeast and the kingdom of God. This week, for example, Bishop Kelvin gives us a wonderful way of understanding the yeast in the dough towards the end of the 3 minutes, so if that interests you, have a listen!

Prayer tree

Draw or paint a picture of a large tree with lots of branches.
Every person draw and cut out either a picture of a bird or a picture of a leaf.
Write prayers on the birds or leaves and glue to the tree as a collective prayer offering.

Treasure battleships

You can either print out the hand out attached for each child, and play individually, in groups, or set up 2 large battleship grids on the floor of your room! Depending on the age of your children, you might like to discern the best way to play this game. You could always have individual sheets printed out as a take home activity too, giving children 2 copies each.

The idea in battleships is to find the opponents ships and sink them. Each team gets to decide where their ships go.
We have replaced the ships in this game with treasure to find! Each treasure is a slightly different size, so the hardest treasure to find will be the mustard seed.

How to play treasure battleships

Place each treasure on on the grid. They can go any direction and can go anywhere, but must not overlap.
Do not show the other team where you have placed your treasure.
Each team takes turns calling out a coordinate -- a letter followed by a number (eg. A1, D4). If you have younger children, you might like to explain how this works, and pair them up with older children. If you have a treasure on this coordinate, the whole treasure is 'found' and is out of the game. If you hit an opponents treasure, mark it on your own board so you know which coordinates you have called already.
The winner at the end is the person who finds all the opponents treasure. You could put a time limit on the game, if it goes on for a long time!

treasure_battleships.pdf
File Size:	22 kb
File Type:	pdf

Download File

Prayer, inspired by Matthew 13:31-33

Dear Lord God
we thank you for mustard seed
and for the wonders of yeast
and for how these things teach us about your love.

Lord, plant your seed into our lives,
help us work your yeast into our hearts
that wonderful things may happen.
We ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.

~ written by Rev. Richard J. Fairchild, and posted on Kir-shalom.

Media

A Lego animation by a children's church in the US

A talk on YouTube about the kingdom of heaven being like a mustard seed

Treasure in a field animation from Max 7

Jacob and Rachel (Genesis 29:15-28)

The Old Testament reading today is about how Jacob is looking for a wife, and falls in love with Rachel. While her father, Laban, is compliant with this request, he makes Jacob work for 7 years for her hand in marriage. On the night of the wedding, Laban tricks Jacob and sends Leah to sleep with him. All we know about Leah is she older and has 'weak eyes' - don't we all, Leah. Jacob is outraged, but honours his marital week with Leah and then also gets to marry Rachel after another 7 years of work.

Sharing hard stories

Sharing hard stories like this one can feel like a minefield in children's ministry! Where do you start! It can be tempting to look at the bible characters in this story and connect this to some moral outcome or behaviour modification, but a bigger question would be where is God in this story?

Leaving out difficult content to make it age appropriate is not diluting the story, it's being careful and considerate of the children you have in your care. We also need to not glamourise and make people 'heroes' when they actually weren't. "Laban was just fulfilling God's promises and it all worked out ok" vs Laban deceived Jacob, and God used the situation regardless of the lies and manipulation he held over Jacob.

God keeps his promises

This story focusses on the broader topic of 'keeping your promise', and brings into light the idea of integrity and staying true to your word.

Jacob loved Rachel so much that he worked humbly and diligently for another 7 years for Laban, although he realised that he could no longer trust his father in law - the only thing that Jacob could trust in was God.