Youth Ministry Object Lesson - Broken Water Balloons

Youth Ministry
Object Lesson -
Broken Water
Balloons
www.CreativeYouthIdeas.com
www.creativeobjectlessons.com

You can’t have summer without
at least one water balloon fight.
Water Balloons have a purpose –
to be filled with water. As God’s
creation each of us also has a
purpose. Pascal said that all men
were created with a God shaped
vacuum – an emptiness in our
lives only GOD can fill. When we
try to fill that emptiness with
things other than the Living
Water, we will always feel empty.
We will always be thirsty.

PLEASE SHARE
THIS IDEA
ON
FACEBOOK
CLICK HERE

Games Using Water Balloons
Back to Back – Split the youth up
into partners however many as
necessary. Then put them next to a
bucket of water balloons. This is a
relay race so have another bucket
about 15 feet away. The players
have to put the water balloon
between both of their backs and
walk to the other bucket. If your
balloon breaks you must go back
and get another balloon. Set a time
limit and when the times run out
see which team has the most water
balloons in their bucket.

Beach Towel Toss – Divide into
teams of two, each person
holding a towel at the corners.
Standing six feet apart, each team
must use the towel to toss a
balloon back and forth with
another team. After a successful
toss, have the teams move farther
apart. Continue playing until the
balloon breaks.
Blanket Water Balloon Toss – All
youth stand around a blanket
holding an edge. When you toss
individual water balloons high
into the air, the youth must try to
catch each water balloon in the
blanket.

Hot Potato, Water Balloon Style –
Played just like Hot Potato, youth
must pass a water balloon around
the circle when the music starts.
When it stops whoever is holding it
has the bust the water balloon on
their own head.
Soaker – one person throws a
water balloon high in the air and
calls out another player’s name or
number. The player so called must
catch the balloon. If the player
succeeds at catching it unbroken,
she gets a free shot at the thrower
who called her name and gets her
turn at throwing a water balloon up
and calling another’s name.

Water Balloon Pinata – Fill
regular sized round balloons up
with water, and tie them to a rope
that is hung between two trees.
You are blindfolded, given a
plastic baseball bat, and get three
swings to break a balloon.
Water Balloon Shot Put – see
who can toss a water balloon the
farthest. For added incentive,
have a leader stand just out of
reach of the players for a target.
Water Balloon Squat – Relay. Run
to the line. Sit on a water balloon.
Return to the team.

Water Balloon Stuff – Get two
sets of those long johns and a
bunch of water balloons. Get two
volunteers and assign them a
team whose job is to stuff water
balloons in the long johns. When
the designated time is up you
count the balloons and the one
with the most balloons wins. The
winner and his stuffers get to
throw all the balloons at the
loser.

Water Balloon Toss – Form two
lines of paired players, facing
each other. Have each pair toss a
water balloon back and forth,
taking a step backwards after
every two tosses. The further
back you step, the further the
toss and the more likely the
water balloon will burst. The last
pair to have their water balloon
intact wins.
WATER BALLOON FIGHT – have a
classic water Balloon war
between two teams.

Water Balloon Toss – Form two
lines of paired players, facing
each other. Have each pair toss a
water balloon back and forth,
taking a step backwards after
every two tosses. The further
back you step, the further the
toss and the more likely the
water balloon will burst. The last
pair to have their water balloon
intact wins.

Water Balloon Toss Relay – Form 2
or more even teams. As in any
relay race, have a starting line and
a finishing line. Spread each
member of the team about 3-5
feet apart. Each member must toss
the water balloon to the next team
member. If the water balloon
breaks or falls onto the floor they
have to start from the very
beginning. The object of the game
is to send 3 water balloon
successfully down the line and into
their team bucket.

Water balloon volleyball – Set up
a volleyball net or string a rope
between two posts, and then split
the youth into groups of two. Give
each group a towel or sheet and
instruct the teams to hold it
between them to create a landing
mat for water balloons. With one
team on each side of the net, the
players use their towel or sheet to
toss the balloon over the net to
the other side. Every time a team
drops a balloon, the balloon
breaks or the balloon doesn’t cross
over the net, the opposite team
earns a point. Play to eight points
before switching out teams.

TAKE IT TO THE NEXT LEVEL
At the end of your water
balloon games, take a hose and
squirt a leader or volunteer
down.
• Compare a water balloon
and a hose? In what ways
are they similar?
Different?
• Describe a time when you
were really thirsty?

MAKE IT SPIRITUAL
During the time of Jeremiah much
of Israel had turned away from
God. They had turned away from
the Fountain of living water and
were looking to other things
(broken cisterns) to satisfy their
spiritual thirst. A cistern was
basically just a hole in the ground
with some kind of lining meant to
hold stagnant rainwater. They
were broken from the very day
they were built. Only God Himself
can quench our spiritual thirst.
(See Isaiah 55:1-2, John 4:10-14,
John 6:35 and John 7:37-38.)

Imagine yourself as a very thirsty
person in a parched land, turning
away from a bubbling spring of cool
water to shovel out a cistern in the
dirt, under the parched sun, in the
hopes of collecting some rain
water! Many people today are also
busy digging cisterns. We are not so
different from the people of
Jeremiah’s day. The one thing that
is different is that we have more
things available to us with which
we try to satisfy the deep longings
and thirsts of our lives.

• Discuss as a group how cisterns
were constructed and the
constant effort it took to
maintain them vs. get
refreshed from a natural spring
of water.
• Digging cisterns is like going our
own way in life. How do our
own plans take constant effort
to maintain?
• What are some of the things
people seek for pleasure,
happiness, to fill the emptiness
of our days?

• Why do people insist on
building broken cisterns rather
than drinking from the spring
of living water that will never
run dry?
• Why do people look for other
sources? Why aren’t people
happy with the Living Water?
• Why do we run from one thing
to another, never finding
satisfaction, but never running
to God?

MAKE IT PRACTICAL
• How do we know if we are
seeking the things of God or
broken cisterns?
• What is it in us that makes us
prefer to do things our way
rather than accept God’s way?
• Is it possible for us to be so
busy doing things that don’t
really matter that you never
became involved in the things
of God? Can we do good things
and yet still neglect God?
Spiritual things?

MAKE IT PERSONAL
• Describe a time when you
sought God to fill a void in your
life that seemed impossible to
face?
• What do I not have in my life
that, if I only had, I believe
would make me happy?
• What do I now have, that, if
taken away, would leave me
unhappy or devastated?
• What do I have now that I spend
a lot of time maintaining and
would struggle to keep?
• What is it that I now have in my
life that I can’t live without?

• God is asking you to see what
you have been doing with
your life. How are you
spending your time, your
money, your abilities, your
resources?
• Are you wasting your life and
ignoring the many
opportunities to be used by
God?
• Where are you going to drink
today, this week this month,
the rest of your life—for all of
eternity? The spring of living
waters or the cisterns of this
world?

• Are you so busy repairing
and refilling your broken
cistern that you never took
advantage of the fountain of
life God offers?
• Ask God to show you the
broken cisterns you have in
your life. Surrender them
and ask Him to satisfy your
soul with Himself alone.
• What are you consuming
that masks your inner thirst?
What deeper needs do you
sense in yourself? Ask God
would to show you how He
can meet that need.

SCRIPTURE
• Jeremiah 2:13 – “My people
have committed two sins: They
have forsaken me, the spring of
living water, and have dug their
own cisterns, broken cisterns
that cannot hold water.”
• John 7:37 – “If anyone is
thirsty, let him come to me and
drink”
• John 10:10 – He said, “I have
come that they may have life,
and have it to the full”

MORE IDEAS? See “Creative Object Lessons”
200 page e-book that explains everything you
need to know when planning your very own
object lessons. It contains 90 fully developed
object lesson ideas and another 200 object
lesson starter ideas based on Biblical idioms
and Names / Descriptions of God.
Learn More…
Creative Object Lessons

Youth Ministry Object Lesson - Broken Water Balloons

Recommended

Recommended

More Related Content

Viewers also liked

Viewers also liked (19)

Similar to Youth Ministry Object Lesson - Broken Water Balloons

Similar to Youth Ministry Object Lesson - Broken Water Balloons (20)

More from Ken Sapp

More from Ken Sapp (20)

Recently uploaded

Recently uploaded (20)

Youth Ministry Object Lesson - Broken Water Balloons