Yokes and Burdens and Children's Sermons with Styrofoam

Last night was the last night of my seminary class; I spent yesterday working on writing my final exam essays, which turned out to be easier than I expected.  Indeed, the hard part was choosing the movies I wanted to use to answer the writing prompts.  Once I settled on the three films, the writing flowed quickly.  Hurrah!

Before we get too far away from my children's sermon on Sunday, I want to make a record of it here.  Even better, I'll post a link to the video my mother took while it was happening.  I arrived with my styrofoam yokes, which I put in the front of the church--it's not the usual decorating that I do, but it did generate interest.

I started by asking the children to visualize the huge field next to the church, and then I asked what we would have to do if we wanted to plant a garden.  Yes, we would have to mow!  What would we use to do that?  Yes, a tractor!  But before tractors were invented, what would we use?  Silence--which was fine.  It led naturally to talking about plows and how animals would help us pull the plow and get the job done more quickly.

I read the passage from the Gospel, Matthew 11:  28-30:  “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

In an ideal world, I'd have had a historic yoke to show them, but I didn't.  So I created one out of styrofoam, but I was sure to talk about how a real yoke would be made with wood, and I brought along a heavy board to help them imagine how it would feel around their necks.  Easy?  How?

I invited my spouse up to show how a yoke with 2 animals would work.  What happens if the animals want to go in different directions?

We had planned to have the yoke split, but we weren't sure what would happen.  We couldn't rehearse without destroying the prop.  But it worked just the way we wanted--it was dramatic and got everyone's attention.

I finished the sermon by talking about God, who invites us to be part of the ongoing creation of the world.  I talked about how much easier it is to get a job done when we have help and when everyone moves in the same direction.   

As I watch the video, I can see places where I could have done more.  But overall, I think this may be my best children's sermon yet.  You can see much of the video here, although my mom didn't start recording until after I had talked about mowing and plows and yokes in general.