Bring in one bowl of sweets wrapped in blue, and another with sweets wrapped in red or orange. Take turns to share something from the past week that caused either despair or happiness. Anyone who shares something sad takes a blue sweet to cheer them up. If they share something positive, they take a red or orange sweet and pass it on, to share the joy.

The reading can be dramatised using different readers for the voices of John, his disciples and Jesus. John’s disciples can walk from him to interrupt Jesus with their question. Jesus answers and then turns to the crowd and reads from verse 7 onwards.

Questions to discuss

• Why do you think John developed doubts about whether Jesus was the Messiah?
• How does Jesus prove he is the promised one?
• How would you feel if someone doubted your character?

Look at the list of actions that Jesus refers to in verse 5. Ask the young people to think about people today who work as opticians, physiotherapists, doctors, audiologists. If you know of anyone who works in one or more of these roles, invite them in to share a little of what they do.

Discuss who it is who suffers when a person is sent to prison. Both the people who were the victims of the offence and the family of the prisoner suffer. Someone in your group may know someone in custody, so ensure sensitivity when discussing this.

Look up the Angel Tree Project. They support families of prisoners especially at Christmas by enabling prisoners to send a gift to their children. Consider how your group could support this work.