We Are All Different

To show that although we are all different, God can and wants to use each one of us

by Gavin Woods

Suitable for Whole School (Pri)

Aims

To show that although we are all different, God can and wants to use each one of us.

Preparation and materials

• This assembly works very well alongside any certificates being awarded.
• You will need an OHP or flip-chart, or some other method of writing down football players' names.
• A collection of about 5 different kitchen utensils (see 2. below).

Assembly

1. Ask the children who they would pick to play in their fantasy football team. Keep going until you have 11 players and list these on the OHP or flip-chart/wipe board. Leave this on display throughout the assembly.
   
   
2. Kitchen quiz: Ask the children to guess the name of the kitchen utensils as you hold them up. Choose about 5 that all have very different uses, e.g. tin opener, sieve, pizza cutter, cheese grater, saucepan. What are they called? What do they do? Have you ever used one? State that each one has a different purpose, but they are all found in the same place.
3. Say that Christians believe that, like the utensils, we are all created by God, but we are all different. Ask them to look left and right to see that we all look different and to look left and right to remember that we are all good at different things.
   
   
4. Point out that the Bible says: 'God has made each one of us to do good things' (Ephesians 2.10). We are all good at different things, although some of us still have to find out what we are good at. A cheese grater would be no good as a saucepan, would it? In the same way God has made us all different - and that's exciting. Wouldn't life be boring if we were all the same, and wouldn't our kitchens be useless if all you could cook with was a rubber glove.
   
   And in football (refer back to your list) we need a balance of different skills: goalkeeper, defenders, midfielders, and attackers. (You could comment on the balance of their team at this point if you are sufficiently knowledgeable, but beware of getting sidetracked from the main theme!) So don't worry if you are not as good as another person at something, because God may have bigger and better plans for you, doing something completely different!

Time for reflection

Pray that God will show each one of us what our skills are, and how they can be used to help others.

In our kitchen we only have forks:
try cooking an egg on a fork!

In our football team we only have defenders:
no one ever scores a goal -
neither us, nor our opponents.
It's so boring, no one wants to watch!

In our world, if everyone were the same
there'd be nothing to say, day after boring day.
But in our world we are all unique:
different, dissimilar, diverse -
all long words for saying…

You're you and I'm me.
And that's a far better way to be.

Song/music

'You can build a wall' (Come and Praise, 91)