Law of Consecration - Primary Lesson

I am a big believer in the Law of Consecration.  My friends and family know that I believe that everything we have been given is from God - our time, talents and material blessings.  Since everything belongs to God and comes from Him, it is our obligation to handle those blessings according to His will.  We are all on earth here together to help each other and share.  (The hard part comes when some people take advantage of others but I figure that is their problem, not mine).

Here's a Primary lesson that teaches on this subject.  The Lord Reveals the Law of Consecration.

I made this worksheet to go along with the lesson.

Here is an example of the worksheet filled in with some answers in case you want an example to look at.

Here's a game that we will play to introduce the lesson:

Play the game “I Don’t Need It—Would You Like It?” to help the children understand the concept of sharing their excess with others. Give each child a piece of paper and a pencil, and have the children list food, clothing, shelter, money, and books and games on their papers. The object of the game is for each child to obtain all the items on the list by either picking the items from the container or receiving them from another child.

Pass the container of papers to a child and have him or her choose a paper, read it, and put it back into the container. Have the child circle the named item on his or her paper. Then pass the container to the next child. When all the children have had a turn, begin again with the first child and have him or her pick another paper.

If on a subsequent turn a child picks an item that is already circled on his or her list, he or she turns to the child on the left and says, “I don’t need it—would you like it?” Then the child sitting to the left can circle that item on his or her list. If that child already has the item circled, he or she asks the question of the next child to the left. Continue until someone is able to circle the item.

Play the game until each child has circled every item on the list.

Here is a game sheet to help the kids log in their answers.  My class is pretty young so I don't want to waste lesson time making them write these things down.

Here are the words that go in the container.

I'm also planning to show a General Conference video of President Monson talking in April 1991 (mentioned in the lesson).  It is from the talk called "A Royal Priesthood" and the story I am using is at 16:00 minutes.

Here are the words in the story but I will show the video on an iPad.  Words and video on on THIS LINK.

When I was a deacon, I loved baseball; in fact, I still do. I had a fielder’s glove inscribed with the name “Mel Ott.” He was the Darryl Strawberry of my day. My friends and I would play ball in a small alleyway behind the houses where we lived. The quarters were cramped but all right, provided you hit straight away to center field. However, if you hit the ball to the right of center, disaster was at the door. Here lived a lady who would watch us play, and as soon as the ball rolled to her porch her English setter would retrieve the ball and present it to Mrs. Shinas as she opened the door. Into her house Mrs. Shinas would return and add the ball to the many she had previously confiscated. She was our nemesis, the destroyer of our fun—even the bane of our existence. None of us had a good word for Mrs. Shinas, but we had plenty of bad words for her. The windows of her house received more special soap treatment on Halloween than did any other. None of us would speak to Mrs. Shinas, and she never spoke to us. She was hampered by a stiff leg which impaired her walking and must have caused her great pain. She and her husband had no children, lived secluded lives, and rarely came out of their house.

This private war continued for some time—perhaps two years—and then an inspired thaw melted the ice of winter and brought a springtime of good feelings to the stalemate. One night as I performed my daily task of hand-watering our front lawn, holding the nozzle of the hose in hand as was the style at that time, I noticed that Mrs. Shinas’s lawn was dry and turning brown. I honestly don’t know what came over me, but I took a few more minutes and, with our hose, watered her lawn. This I did each night, and then when autumn came, I hosed her lawn free of leaves as I did ours and stacked the leaves in piles at the street’s edge to be burned or gathered. During the entire summer I had not seen Mrs. Shinas. We had long since given up playing ball in the alley. We had run out of baseballs and had no money to buy more.

Then early one evening, her front door opened, and Mrs. Shinas beckoned for me to jump the small fence and come to her front porch. This I did, and as I approached her, Mrs. Shinas invited me into her living room, where I was asked to sit in a comfortable chair. She went to the kitchen and returned with a large box filled with baseballs and softballs, representing several seasons of her confiscation efforts. The filled box was presented to me; however, the treasure was not to be found in the gift, but rather in her voice. I saw for the first time a smile come across the face of Mrs. Shinas, and she said, “Tommy, I want you to have these baseballs, and I want to thank you for being kind to me.” I expressed my own gratitude to her and walked from her home a better boy than when I entered. No longer were we enemies. Now we were friends. The Golden Rule had again succeeded.