God has given the Church pastors who follow and teach the Bible to help us love and follow him. My kids LOVE our pastors and we pray for them every day. (My 5 year old considers it her job to make sure our senior pastor gets hugged every week.) Good pastors are a gift from our Good Shepherd. We can and should thank God for pastors who serve the Church by helping us know and follow Jesus.
I want to show you an activity that’s a fun and simple way to help children get to know their pastor and thank God that he helps their family follow Jesus. This pastor appreciation activity is adapted from our FREE lesson, Thank You for My Pastor!, which also includes a memory verse and discussion questions with a coloring page that can be used to point kids to Jesus, the ultimate head of the Church.
Meet the Pastor! Activity for Kids
Prepare: Bible, Meet the Pastor Questions (See printable below. Have your pastor answer these questions ahead of time.), picture of your pastor (optional)
Say: Who are some people who help you know what is true and right? God wants you to know what’s true and right so he has given you the Bible and he has given you people to help you learn about and follow him. One of these people is a pastor. A pastor is a leader in the church who helps people listen to and follow God. Listen to some of the instructions God has given to pastors. (Read 1 Peter 5:2-4.) The word “pastor” actually means shepherd. What does a shepherd do? A shepherd leads and takes care of sheep. In a similar way, a pastors job is to lead and care for the people in his church. The Bible also calls pastors “elders.” A pastor or elder is kind of like a little shepherd working for Jesus, the Good Shepherd, by teaching and showing people how to follow God. Jesus is the ultimate Good Shepherd. He’s the one who saves God’s family, the church, from sin so we can be with God. (Read John 10:11.) After he rose from the dead and went back to Heaven, Jesus gave instructions for church leaders to help people follow him. Pastors lead the church by helping people follow Jesus. Listening to a pastor who teaches the Bible helps you listen to God. Our pastor and other church leaders aren’t perfect, but they have a special job of working for God by taking care of God’s sheep. We should thank God for giving us people like pastors to help guide us. We’re going to get to know our pastor a bit better and then pray for him.
Do: Ask your pastor to answer these questions ahead of time then let the children guess the pastor’s answers. If possible, show a picture of your pastor or invite your pastor to join you and personally share the correct answers after the children guess. (For churches with multiple pastors, you can divide the questions among the pastors so the children will get to know a little about each one.)
Questions:
- What’s your favorite food?
- What’s your favorite color?
- What’s your favorite kind of ice cream?
- What’s your favorite animal?
- What’s one of your favorite Bible verses?
- When is your favorite time to read the Bible?
- What do you enjoy about being a pastor?
- How can we pray for you?
Respond: Have the children take turns praying for the pastor and thanking God for him. Encourage them to think of a way to use what they have learned about the pastor to encourage him. Perhaps they could draw a picture of his favorite animal, buy his favorite kind of ice cream, or pray for him and then let him know they prayed for him.
(You can print the questions below and give them to your pastor to answer ahead of time. PPTs slides for each question are also available in the FREE Thank You for My Pastor! lesson on our Resources page.)
I hope you can use this activity to help your family or church thank God for the church leaders he has given you. If you don’t have a pastor because your family doesn’t have a church, I want to encourage you to find a church with a pastor who teaches what the Bible says. The church is God’s family and God wants you to be with his family to help you learn how much he loves you and to help you follow him. Why don’t you talk to your family today about going to church next Sunday? Maybe you could even meet the pastor and ask him about some of his favorite things!
Oh, and if you’d like to meet MY pastor (because I’m sure you’re burning with curiosity about his opinions on aardvarks and BBQ sandwiches), check out the video below to see how I used this activity with kids in my own church.
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