Object Lesson - Spiritually Measuring Up

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Object Lesson
- Spiritually
Measuring Up
www.CreativeObjectLessons.com

It's back to school time. Time
to get all your school supplies
and meet new friends. These
games all have a ruler as the
central prop and serve as a
discussion start for measuring
up to God's standards. I
remember the days of using a
ruler to create a growth chart
on the door frame. But how
do we measure our growth as
Christians?

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Games using a Ruler
Back Flip Rulers – Back flip rulers
is a variation of the minute-to-win-
it game “Back Flip” The
objective is simple – palms down,
rest several rulers on the back of
your hand. Now flip them up and
catch them all in the same hand.
Person who can catch the most
rulers at once wins.

Dice it Up – Another Minute-to-win-
it game, youth must place a
ruler into their mouth and stack a
die on the end of the ruler. The
die is not allowed to touch a
youth’s nose or face. If the die
falls off, the youth must choose
another die to put on the ruler.
Once the first die is in place, the
player can pick up another die
and put it on top of the first die.
He has to continue adding a die
until he’s stacked six die on top of
one another. The dice have to be
balanced for 3 seconds at least.
First youth to be successful wins.

Feather Relay – Give individuals
or teams a ruler with a feather,
leaf or some other light object on
it. The idea is to see who can go
across the room and back again,
keeping the elusive object on his
or her ruler. If the object blows
off, it must be replaced before the
contestant can continue.

Herding Cats – Ever tried to herd
a cat? They have a mind of their
own. Give each team of youth one
ruler and a cat (a lemon or raw
egg.) Teams line up at the starting
line, than at the signal, the first
player pushes the cat to the goal
and back using only the ruler. That
player passes the ruler to the
teammate who is next in line, and
so on until all youth on a team
have run. The team that finishes
first wins. Other variations are to
set up an obstacle course.

Longest Line – Give each group a
ruler and a few school supplies if
you have some. Then give the
following instructions – “Using
what you have, create the longest
line possible.” The key to this
game is they have more than the
objects you have given to them.
They can use a belt, a shoe lace,
keys, coins, paper money, etc to
create a long line of objects. We
often look to God to give us
resources to get things done, but
we often have more than we
realize if we expand our thinking.

Peas on a Ruler – Place a pile of
peas (equal number of peas in
each) for each team at one end of
the room and an empty bowl for
each at the opposite end. Give the
first person in each line a ruler.
Youth must run to their pea pile
and scoop up as many peas on the
ruler as they can, and bring them
back and dump them into the
empty bowl. They then give the
rulers to the next person in line,
who repeat the process. The first
team to transfer its peas from the
pile to the bowl is the winner.

Any peas which fall along the way
must also he picked up on the
ruler and brought to the bowl.
Players may have more than one
run until all the peas are
transferred, but must continue in
the same order as they initially
began. They may not put the
experts at the beginning of the
line the second time through.

Ruler Catapult – Take a ruler and a
square rubber pencil eraser. Place the
ruler on the edge of a book or table.
Place the eraser at one of the ruler and
slam the other end of the ruler towards
the floor. HARD. Whoever can get the
eraser to fly the furthest wins!
Ruler Delivery – Choose a collection of
objects of increasing size to be passed
from the front of the line to the back of
the line for each team using a ruler in
each person’s mouth. First team to
pass all the objects to the end of the
line wins. Here are some ideas for
objects: Cotton Balls, Ping Pong Balls,
an egg (raw or hard boiled), marbles,
lemon, apple, inflated balloon, ice
cube.

Ruler Fencing – Players hold a
ruler with a square rubber eraser
on it in one hand. In the other
hand the players hold an empty
ruler. Then they try to knock the
opponents’ eraser off the ruler
without losing their own eraser.
Ruler of the world – roll a marble
down a ruler and into a bowl. First
team to do it successfully wins.
Make it more difficult by using a
yardstick or meter ruler.

Rulers – This is the game of
spoons but played with rulers.
Depending on the number of
players, you need at least one
deck of cards, and one ruler less
than the number of players.
Players sit in a circle with the
rulers in the middle of the circle
with their ends touching. To
begin, each player is dealt 4 cards.
The first player picks up a card
from the top of the pile, and can
choose to keep it, or pass it to the
person on his or her left.

Players can only hold a maximum
of four cards. When someone gets
four of a kind, he grabs a ruler.
Once one person grabs a ruler,
everyone else also grabs one until
all the rulers are gone and 1
person is left without a ruler. Play
resumes with one less player and
one less ruler. Play continues until
there is only one player left, the
winner.

Standing Broad Grin – Measure
everyone’s grin with a ruler to see who
has the widest smile. Offer first, second,
and third place prizes to the biggest
smiles.
Tallest Tower – Bring in a variety of
school supplies, including a ruler. Each
team of students must create the tallest
tower using the supplies you have
provided. Then bring the school supplies
back together and command the them
to create the tallest tower. Of course the
tools will simply lie where they are put.
NOTE: These tools are very useful, but
only when they are in someone’s hands.
The same thing is true of us. We can be
useful to God, and be used to teach
others life changing truths, but only
when we place ourselves in God’s hands.

Main Lesson Idea – Measuring Up
Measuring Up – Participants must
scour the room and use a ruler find
objects that match the
measurements they are given… first
to get them all correct gets a prize.
You must first of course, make a list
of measurements of various items
found in the youth room or
throughout the church.

Rules
1. Teams must stay together as a
group. You may not split up.
2. Stay within the designated game
area. Any group found outside
the game area or in banned
areas will be disqualified.
3. No communicating or
collaborating with other teams.

4. Be respectful and courteous in
everything you do. Crude
language, inappropriate
behavior, and offensive actions
are not allowed. Respect other
people’s property. Do not
destroy things. When the hunt
is over, there should be no sign
that it took place.
5. Respect each other. Do not
cheat. Do not hinder other
teams.

Scoring
1. Only one submission for each
item on the list. Multiple
submissions are not allowed.
Label submissions with
corresponding numbers so the
judges know which items are
intended for which things on
the list. You are not required to
complete every item on the list.
2. Teams can only qualify once for
each item on the list.

3. Stick to the Time Limit. A
penalty will be imposed for
each minute after the deadline
that you are late. In case of a
tie, the first team to finish
wins.
4. How to Win? Points will be
assigned to these based on the
difficulty to accomplish each,
creativity and the fun factor.
The team with the most points
wins!

TAKE IT TO THE NEXT LEVEL
MAKE IT SPIRITUAL
• What are some things people
use to measure or evaluate
living a good life?
use to measure other people?
use to measure themselves?
• How do we measure a person as
a success or failure?
• What are some of the standards
of measurement from God’s
Word?

You might give them some helpful
scriptures to write on their rulers:
• Love – I Corinthians 13:4-7
• Holiness – Hebrews 12.14;
Revelation 21.27
• Righteousness – 2 Corinthians
5:21, Romans 3:23
• Christian Living – Romans
12:10-21
• Maturity – Ephesians 4:1-13

Discussion: If your ruler had been
marked wrongly, you would have
found it difficult to find any of the
objects. When our measurements
of obedience, ourselves (pride),
expectations (jealousy),
comparisons with others, and
timing (patience) are wrong it
messes up our results. Our
standards for measurement must
be exact and based on God’s Word
or every measurement we make
will be wrong. God’s Word is to be
the ruler for our life. When we use
other things as rulers our
measurements come out wrong.

MAKE IT PRACTICAL
In the Old Testament, the focus on
godliness was living by God’s Laws
and commandments. But as a
Christian, the focus of the life is no
longer the laws and standards, but
instead focused on a person – Christ.
It’s not a set of rules but a
relationship. We are to follow Christ
and live for Him.
• Romans 6:14 “For sin shall no
longer be your master, because
you are not under the law, but
under grace.”
• Romans 8:1-17

• What difference does it make
in the way you live your life to
know that you are no longer
under the law, but under
grace?
• Under the law you are fearful
of making a mistake, but
under grace you are focused
on pleasing God and acting
out of gratitude. How does
this make a difference in how
you live life?

MAKE IT PERSONAL
• How do you measure your
life? How do you measure
up?
• What are some of the
things you use to measure
your spiritual growth? Your
spiritual journey?
• In what way does Grace
give you freedom to live
more effectively for Christ?

SCRIPTURE
Romans 3:23 – “For all have sinned,
and come short of the glory of God”
– We don’t measure up to God’s
standard.
Ephesians 2:8-10 – “For it is by grace
you have been saved, through
faith—and this is not from
yourselves, it is the gift of God — not
by works, so that no one can boast.
For we are God’s handiwork, created
in Christ Jesus to do good works,
which God prepared in advance for
us to do.” – Because we don’t
measure up, we cannot boast. This
free us to advance in good works,
not out of striving to be worthy.

Ephesians 4:11-12 – “So Christ
himself gave the apostles, the
prophets, the evangelists, the
pastors and teachers, to equip his
people for works of service, so
that the body of Christ may be
built up until we all reach unity in
the faith and in the knowledge of
the Son of God and become
mature, attaining to the whole
measure of the fullness of Christ.”
– our goal is to measure up to the
life of Christ.

Galatians 2:16 – “know that a person
is not justified by the works of the
law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So
we, too, have put our faith in Christ
Jesus that we may be justified by
faith in Christ and not by the works
of the law, because by the works of
the law no one will be justified.”
Hebrews 12:1 – “Therefore, since we
are surrounded by such a great cloud
of witnesses, let us throw off
everything that hinders and the sin
that so easily entangles. And let us
run with perseverance the race
MARKED OUT for us.” God still marks
out a direction for us to strive toward
as Christians.

2 Corinthians 5:21 – “God made him
who had no sin to be sin[a] for us, so
that in him we might become the
righteousness of God.” – We don’t
have to measure up to righteousness
because we wear Christ’s
righteousness.
Colossians 2:13-14 – “When you
were dead in your sins and in the
uncircumcision of your flesh, God
made you alive with Christ. He
forgave us all our sins, having
canceled the charge of our legal
indebtedness, which stood against us
and condemned us; he has taken it
away, nailing it to the cross.” – God
wiped away the shortcoming so that
before him we measure up in Christ.

2 Peter 1:3-9 – “His divine power has
given us everything we need for life
and godliness through our
knowledge of him who called us by
his own glory and goodness. Through
these he has given us his very great
and precious promises, so that
through them you may participate in
the divine nature and escape the
corruption in the world caused by
evil desires. For this very reason,
make every effort to add to your
faith goodness; and to goodness,
knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control;
and to self-control,
perseverance;

and to perseverance, godliness; and
to godliness, brotherly kindness; and
to brotherly kindness, love. For if you
possess these qualities in increasing
measure, they will keep you from
being ineffective and unproductive in
your knowledge of our Lord Jesus
Christ. But if anyone does not have
them, he is nearsighted and blind,
and has forgotten that he has been
cleansed from his past sins.” – Now
we are measure by growth in the our
journey to becoming more and more
Christlike.

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Object Lesson - Spiritually Measuring Up

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