Hinges
Children's sermon
Object:
a hinge
Good morning, boys and girls. I brought a hinge with me today. Do you know what a hinge is? (let them answer) A hinge is a special metal piece with three parts to it. It has one flat piece on one side and another flat piece on the other side. Then the two flat pieces are joined together with a round piece that lets both of the pieces move. Where would you see a hinge in your house? (let them answer) You have hinges on all the doors in your house. All the cupboards have hinges and any toy boxes with covers probably have hinges. Why do we have hinges? (let them answer) Hinges let things like doors open and close. If you didn't have hinges, doors would be just a piece of material in front of the doorway. A hinge hooks onto the door with one flat side and the other flat side is screwed into the doorway, with one hinge near the top of the door and one hinge near the bottom of the door.
We have hinges on our bodies. Can you think of where they might be? (let them guess) They're in our knees and our elbows. Look at how they bend just like opening and closing a door. (demonstrate) Knees have lots of parts to them. They have cartilage and ligaments. The kneecap protects all the underneath parts. It's called the patella. The knee has a special oil inside it to reduce friction. Friction on a door hinge makes the door squeak like this. (make a squeaky door sound) Then we put oil on it to stop the squeaking. But our knees have that special oil right inside our bodies.
Today is sometimes called Palm Sunday. That's the day when many people watched Jesus ride by on a donkey. They threw their coats and palm branches down for him to ride on like a soft carpet. And then they used one of the hinges in their bodies. Do you know which one? Right, they used their knees. They bowed down because they wanted Jesus to be their king. The Bible says that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend. That's what the people did on Palm Sunday. They bent their knees by bowing to Jesus. Can you show me how they bowed? (demonstrate and have them bow) Sometimes we bow when we pray. It's a way to show that we love God. We bend our knees and bow our heads.
We have hinges on our bodies. Can you think of where they might be? (let them guess) They're in our knees and our elbows. Look at how they bend just like opening and closing a door. (demonstrate) Knees have lots of parts to them. They have cartilage and ligaments. The kneecap protects all the underneath parts. It's called the patella. The knee has a special oil inside it to reduce friction. Friction on a door hinge makes the door squeak like this. (make a squeaky door sound) Then we put oil on it to stop the squeaking. But our knees have that special oil right inside our bodies.
Today is sometimes called Palm Sunday. That's the day when many people watched Jesus ride by on a donkey. They threw their coats and palm branches down for him to ride on like a soft carpet. And then they used one of the hinges in their bodies. Do you know which one? Right, they used their knees. They bowed down because they wanted Jesus to be their king. The Bible says that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend. That's what the people did on Palm Sunday. They bent their knees by bowing to Jesus. Can you show me how they bowed? (demonstrate and have them bow) Sometimes we bow when we pray. It's a way to show that we love God. We bend our knees and bow our heads.
