Youth Group Game: Hidden Identity

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Bible: Ephesians 4:32 Topic: Kindness

Use this back to school game to teach students the importance of kindness. Students will have to try to discovery each other’s hidden identities while at the same time trying to protect their own. They will learn just how easy it is for people to hide who they are and what they’re going through, so it’s extremely important to show everyone God’s kindness.

Supplies:

• Pictures of people that everyone in your group will know.These could be leaders, movie stars, or famous people.
• Popsicle sticks
• Tape
• Music

Before the game, tape the pictures to the popsicles sticks, creating handheld “characters.” Have the students gather in a circle, with their backs towards the inside of the circle.

Have them spread out enough that they can’t see the person next to them. Pass out the characters so that everyone has one.When you say go, they have to keep their characters hidden while trying to guess other students characters. They can ask each other any questions they can think of in order to try and guess the correct characters.

Everyone must answer the questions honestly. Whenever you turn on the music, students must run back and assemble in the same backwards-facing circle where they cannot see each other. When this happens, everyone must pass their character to the left, and take on a new character.

The more you turn on the music, the harder the game gets.Students may be so close to guessing a character, only to have the music turn on and now have to keep track of who they think that person is not. When someone’s character is guessed correctly, that student is out of the game.

The last remaining student to keep their character’s identity hidden wins.

Ask:

• Would you say it was hard or easy to keep your identity hidden in the game?
• Do you think it’s just as hard or easy to keep things hidden from each other in real life

Teach – Kindness

Say: In the game we just played, we saw just how easy it is to hide who you are. Let’s talk about how that plays out in real life. This year in your school, you’re going to meet a ton of people you don’t know. You’re also going to meet people that while you kind of know who they are, you don’t know everything about them.

Just like in the game, where we all hide who we were from each other, there are going to be a lot of students in your school who are very good at hiding things. Sure, they may not be hiding their name or their character, but they could be hiding other stuff.

The kind of stuff that really isn’t that much fun to talk about. They may be hiding things like a rough home life, or the fact that they really don’t have any close friends. They may be hiding the fact that they hate the way they look or that they’re failing school because they can’t keep up.

Those types of things don’t tend to make you a lot of friends, so it’s easy to believe that maybe it’s just better to keep them hidden.

Ask:

• Have you ever kept things hidden from people you knew at school?
• What reasons do you think people have to keep the not so great things in their life hidden?

As Christ-followers, we should treat everyone that we meet with kindness. While it’s easier to show kindness to those that you know and like, everyone deserves to have someone be kind to them. When you know someone is going through something, it makes you sympathetic.

And it’s just easier to show kindness to someone you feel sympathy towards. It’s so important to remember that everyone you meet could be going through hard times.

Their life outside of school may be absolutely horrible, and just like you were able to conceal your secret during the game, they conceal their secret during school.

Ask:

• Do you think it’s easier to be kind to someone when you know they’re going through a hard time?
• Is it hard for you to show kindness to strangers?
• Why do you think kindness is so important?
• Have you ever been in a situation where someone showing you kindness made a difference in the way you felt?

Read: Ephesians 4:32 “Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.”

Say: We are supposed to be kind and compassionate and forgive each other.Why? Because Christ forgave us. Think of all the bad things in your life—the wrong choices you’ve made, the things you should have done but didn’t, the times you’ve ignored God. I’m sure there have been plenty of reasons for God to stop showing you kindness.But does He?Of course not.

Instead, He just forgives you.And He asks you to show His kindness to other people. When you think of God’s great kindness towards you, it’s impossible to not want to be kind to others.

Ask:

• What are some ways you can show kindness to the people around you at your school?
• Does remembering how much God has forgiven you motivate you to be kind to others?
• Do you have anyone specific in your mind from your school that you know could use a little extra kindness?
• Do you think that people notice when you’re kind to them?

Wrap up

You are going to brush elbows with people this year who are going through things you will never know about.And while you can’t do anything about that, you can do one thing. You can show them kindness.Something that’s so simple on your part can make a bigger difference than you know on their part. Just remember that God asks you to be kind, compassionate, and forgive.

If you take this to heart, you will have an incredible impact on so many people’s lives this year.

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