If you have never heard Jay Carty (former center for the LA Lakers)speak before, check him out on www.youtube.com sometime. Jay wrote a paperback book years ago entitled "Counter Attack- Taking Back Ground Lost to Sin" which is excellent www.jaycarty.com The basic outline of the routine is presented below (and thanks to Jay Carty for the inspiration):

Needed: "Jumping Ropes" magic trick - A Jim Jayes Creation (Pokey Series). Available through many dealers distributed through Dale Lorenzo Enterprises (916-481-2595). It is listed under "Jump Rope trick" on www.penguinmagic.com See the trick demonstrated on www.youtube.com by putting in the search box "Jump Ropes de Jim Jayes".

Routine (extremely shortened- you will have to fill in the details- I have written out the Bible verses onto poster boards, each verse is read during the routine by a volunteer child/kid who is old enough to read well):

Show the red rope in the red bag. "Here is Roger Bus, a sinner! I need help! My sins are as scarlet!" Show the white rope in the white bag. "I need forgiveness, to be as white as this other beautiful clean rope here, forgiveness which only is given by a perfect Savior as represented by this beautiful white color over here." "So how am I forgiven?"

Have child read 1 John 1:9 (NIV) while switching bag locations. "By confessing our sins, you and I can be made white as snow!" (pull out white rope out of red bag) "...because our Savior has taken our sins upon himself (pull out red rope out of the white bag)upon the cross! What a loving Savior in Jesus we all have!"

Switch the bags back. "Then the Bible says I can revert back and then go ahead and sin and sin and lie and cheat and do mean things and use bad words as much as I want, right?" Pull the red rope out of the red bag again. (Kids will yell out No! hopefully).

"What does the Bible say about that?- sinning out of control- over and over and over and over and over and over and over again without any desire to really stop it?"

Have a child read Romans 6:1. "No! We should not just go on intentionally sinning like crazy, since I and we have died to sin, how can we intentionally continue to wallow in it like a pig in mud?"

"But we can still be forgiven since we are all not perfect throughout our lives, Right? Right!" Read 1 John 1:9 again. Switch bags again, pull out the white rope from the red bag, the red rope from the right bag.

Switch bags back. "Well how do we keep from sinning all the time over and over and over and over and over and over (say in a rolling voice like a roller coaster)?" Pull both ropes out of their bags, placing them aside.

Have kid read (should be a good reader) 2 Corinthians 10:5. "What should I do? What does this verse say? By demolishing bad arguments and ideas that oppose our knowledge about God, to take grab every thought I think and make it obedient to the Truth of Christ's Word! When we think a bad thought first, we can then throw it away out of our brain like yesterday's garbage- get rid of it before it stinks up our brains like dirty socks even more in the future. Get rid of those sinful thoughts right away- and all us have them from time to time- before they can grow and grow and get even more nasty and even grow mind mold on them! Yuucckkk! We need to learn to hate sin not only because it offends us, it offends our perfect God as well! So much so He gave His own Son as our sacrifice for all our sins."

"But more than that, God has given us the Holy Spirit to help us to be controlled by pleasing things, not bad things or thoughts." Have child read Romans 8:5. "God has given us each the Holy Spirit to be wrapped up completely in our lives, to be controlled by the Holy Spirit as the verse says, so the Holy Spirit becomes literally part of our lives all the time." Take out the two multi colored red white ropes out of each bag. "So that is the what Paul tells us, we each become as To Live Is Christ." "We want Him in our lives all the time, to really know Christ, not just know about Him, but to be like Him as Paul says in Philippians Chapter 3, not just when we want to be forgiven for something bad we have done."

"That is the secret of fighting against sinning constantly, and although none of us are perfect, far from it, we can take back the ground lost to sin in our lives and live triumphantly in the power of our risen Saviour!"

Thank the children readers, collect back the verse posters, and have them return to their seats.

Oh I forgot, at the very end, I asked the kids if any of them knew "how I did it". And right on cue, a girl said "you have another rope in each bag." So at the end of the routine with or without this question being asked, you show both bags completely empty.

An easy to do trick that is relatively inexpensive to purchase. I would not do it for a stage show or large audience with adults in it most likely, but it is good little simple illustration for a Sunday School type setting of 50 younger aged kids or less (and it worked well for me last Sunday when I tried it out).

Just an OT message about Jay Carty. On his youtube message entitled "Grace & Mercy"- he talks about his children's book "Hall of Champions." You can listen to the audio book free for this book at www.jaycarty.com and you can even download this entire book via a free pdf file as well at this web site. If you have small kids, consider reading a chapter a night to them- Jay knows the clever use of words to make a impactful point. Jay Carty's short message on evangelism on youtube is an encouragement for anyone with unsaved friends and family.

Is the jumping rope trick on a dvd, so I can make my own.

I don't believe it is on DVD - the trick is worth buying as it can be used for this awesome routine that Roger has shared and it comes with the additional kicker ending of the Red/White striped ropes.

Can the bags be examined at the end ?

Yes

Brilliant idea