February 11 – “What does the fox say?”

I know I usually talk about the kids’ sermon at church on Mondays, but I got a little carried away with Loopy Mooses (or is that Meece) and Gideons and ice skating.  Speaking of Moose, by the way … his wife posted on FaceBook that they have diagnosed him with a severe case of bursitis.  He has to stay with the antibiotics until it’s gone.  Good at least that they seem to have a handle on it.

So about the kiddos.  The main teaching was still about the man blind from birth that Jesus healed, so we went a little different direction.  Here’s the summary:

Today we’re going to think about being blind, but in a different way.  Last week you got to use your sense of feeling to see if you could figure out what something is.  Today you’ll have to use a different sense: Hearing!  We’ll play a sound and you have to tell us what makes that sounds. 

The kids then stood in front of the crowd with their backs to the screen.  We played a video that ran through some typical animal sounds (and some not-so typical!).  Each new sound was accompanied by a picture of the critter as well as the name, so we couldn’t let the kids watch.  After each sound the kids were given a chance to guess what the animal was.  It made for a really fun sequence.  They did great with the moos and meows and barks, of course.  They nailed the hyena.  They even got the bear’s growl right away.  It was not so easy to pick out the differences between the lion and the tiger and the cheetah, though.  We all got a kick out of hearing a giraffe and a zebra with their odd noises.  And we heard the answer to the age-old question, “What does the fox say?”  Actually it sounded more like a wolf than a fox to me.  My favorite answer came after hearing one of the roars, either the lion or the tiger.  One of the kids piped up, “It’s a panda!”  A panda?  What do they sound like, anyway?  I’m gonna have to look that one up now. 

I assured them that did a great job.  But the point once again was, we have an advantage.  We have been to a zoo.  We have seen those animals before.  So we already had kind of a mental picture of what those animals looked like.  In the story, though, the man had been born blind, so he had no idea what anything looked like.  And then, suddenly, Jesus heals him.  He can see for the first time ever!  That had to be a pretty special feeling.

Luke 11:28 says, “He replied, ‘Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it.’”

Father, it’s always easier to read your word than it is to actually do it.  Help me with that obeying part.  Amen.