October 2026 General Conference › Lessons › President Dieter F. Uchtdorf › Children

30-minute lesson · Children · Ages 3–11: Primary or home

Jesus Brings Us Together

From “Christ-Centered Unity,” by President Dieter F. Uchtdorf · Sunday afternoon session, October 2026 General Conference

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The big idea

Jesus loves everyone and brings us together; when we come closer to Him, we come closer to each other.

Objective

Children will say that Jesus brings us together and choose one way to help someone feel they belong this week.

Before you teach

  • Read President Uchtdorf’s talk, “Christ-Centered Unity.” You will teach one idea from it: Jesus brings us together.
  • Bring a picture of the Savior.
  • Bring a blanket or sheet and a soft ball.
  • Bring paper and crayons for each child.
  • Clear a space big enough for the children to stand in a wide circle.

Lesson plan

Thirty minutes in 6 parts. Times are a guide; let the Spirit and the learners set the pace.

3 min0–3

Welcome and one short truth

  1. Greet each child by name. Sing “Jesus Said Love Everyone” and invite a child to pray.
  2. Teach the truth with actions: hold your hands far apart, then bring them together and clasp them while saying, Jesus brings us together. Have the children do it with you three times: once in a regular voice, once in a whisper, once standing up.
  3. Tell them that President Uchtdorf, an Apostle of Jesus Christ, taught this at general conference.
5 min3–8

The blanket and the ball

  1. Lay the blanket flat on the floor with the ball in the middle. Ask one child to lift the blanket alone, holding just one corner, and keep the ball from rolling off. It will roll off. Thank the child for trying.
  2. Now invite every child to hold an edge. Lift together and keep the ball in the middle. Try raising and lowering it slowly, then walking in a circle.
  3. Sit down around the blanket. Ask the questions below.
  4. Explain: Heavenly Father’s family is like this. Everyone is needed. President Uchtdorf said to each of us, “It would be incomplete without you.” Explain that incomplete means someone is missing.
Ask
  • What happened when one person tried alone?
  • What changed when everyone helped?
6 min8–14

Jesus loved people who were left out

  1. Hold up the picture of the Savior. Explain that when Jesus lived on the earth, many people stayed away from each other. Some would not talk to people from other places. President Uchtdorf taught that Jesus reached out to people who were left out.
  2. Tell the story Jesus told in Luke 10:30–37 in simple words: a man was hurt and needed help. Two people saw him and walked by. Then a Samaritan came. People in that land usually stayed away from Samaritans, but he stopped, helped the man and took care of him.
  3. Act it out. Choose a child to sit as the traveler who needs help, two to walk by, and one to be the Samaritan who stops, kneels and helps. Everyone else walks in place along the road. Repeat with new actors if time allows.
  4. Ask the questions below. Then do the hand action and say the truth together again.
Ask
  • Who was the kind one in the story?
  • Why do you think Jesus wants us to help people who are different from us?
5 min14–19

Step closer

  1. Put the picture of the Savior on a chair in the middle of the room. Have the children stand in a wide circle around it, arms stretched out so they cannot touch each other.
  2. Explain that President Uchtdorf named ways to be more like Jesus: more patient, kinder, more forgiving, more helpful. Each time a child names something kind they can do, such as sharing, saying sorry, helping or waiting for a turn, everyone takes one step toward the picture.
  3. Keep going until the children are shoulder to shoulder. Ask what happened to the space between them.
  4. Read the first key quote slowly (“The closer we come to Him…”). Have the children repeat it after you in two parts.
Ask
  • When we all came closer to Jesus, what happened to us?
6 min19–25

Draw a way to help someone belong

  1. Give each child paper and crayons. Share President Uchtdorf’s invitation: “Please, come and see, come and help, and come and belong.” Explain that to belong means to know you are wanted and needed.
  2. Ask each child to draw themselves helping someone feel they belong: inviting someone to play, sitting by someone new, sharing, learning someone’s name.
  3. As they draw, walk around and ask each child to tell you about the picture. Share President Chibota’s idea from this conference in your own words: helping someone feel seen can begin with learning their name.
5 min25–30

Show, promise and sing

  1. Invite each child to hold up their drawing and say in one sentence what they will do this week. This is your check for understanding.
  2. Share President Uchtdorf’s promise in simple words: when we come together in Jesus’s name and build bridges and not walls, we will feel Heavenly Father close to us. Read the second key quote (“We have the Savior, and we have each other.”).
  3. Bear a short testimony that each child is a child of God, as Elder Fale taught at this conference, and that Jesus loves every one of them.
  4. Do the hand action and say the truth one last time. Sing “Love One Another” and close with prayer.
  5. Follow up next week: ask who did what they drew. Let each child who wants to tell about it add a step toward the picture of the Savior.

Key passages from the talk

“The closer we come to Him, the closer we will come to each other”

President Uchtdorf’s talk, paragraph 21

“We have the Savior, and we have each other.”

President Uchtdorf’s talk, paragraph 28

“It would be incomplete without you.”

President Uchtdorf’s talk, paragraph 29

The speaker’s direct invitation

“Please, come and see, come and help, and come and belong.”

President Uchtdorf’s talk, paragraph 29

Scriptures

  • Luke 10:30–37 Tell the story in simple words in segment 3 and have the children act it out.
  • Matthew 18:20 With older children, read it aloud in the last segment and ask where Jesus promises to be when we gather in His name.

Other voices that agree

“I am a child of God and He loves me.”

Elder Fale · I Am a Child of God, paragraph 1

“Often, helping others feel seen as children of God begins with something as simple as learning their name.”

President Chibota · A Child of God, paragraph 4

Three things to remember

  • Jesus loves everyone.
  • Jesus brings us together.
  • I can help someone feel they belong.

Ways to act this week

  • Do what you drew: help one person feel they belong this week.
  • Learn the name of one child at church or school you do not know yet.
  • At home, do the hand action and tell your family that Jesus brings us together.

Suggestions written for this lesson, not the speaker’s words.

Music

  • Jesus Said Love Everyone
  • Love One Another

Adapting the lesson

  • Ages 3–7. Keep each part short and moving. Do the blanket and ball twice, tell the story in four sentences and let every child have a turn being the helper. In the stepping game, name the kind things yourself and let the children shout a step word together. Give a helper the job of holding the picture of the Savior. Repeat the hand action and the truth after every activity.
  • Ages 8–11. Invite a child to read Luke 10:33–34 aloud before the acting, and another to read Matthew 18:20 at the end. Let an older child lead the stepping game. Ask a harder question: President Uchtdorf said baptism makes us part of a covenant people; how can someone who has been baptized help everyone at church feel they belong? Mention that at the sacrament we all remember Jesus together.

This lesson is an independent study aid written for this site. It is not an official lesson of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Quotations are word for word from the official talk; paragraph numbers count the paragraphs of the talk as published at churchofjesuschrist.org, not counting headings or picture captions. The activities, questions and ideas for acting are suggestions; follow the Spirit and adapt them to those you teach.