If you wish to preach to the little folks and cause them to remember
what you have said, try the post-card sermon.
When you announce the sermon for little eyes ask them to come to the
front of the church and stand around the pulpit. Then hand to each
child a pictorial post-card and make it the subject of your talk to
them. Tell them the card now belongs to them, and they can take it
home with them to keep. Preach about the picture on the card, calling
their attention to every little detail. Drive home some truth as
pictured on the card. Ask them to look intently at every point in the
picture you are talking about.
This sermon should not be over seven minutes long. Children find it
difficult to stand in one place for any length of time. If you seek
to hold their attention too long, they will grow tired and their
interest will slacken. You must be brief.
There are beautiful post-cards without number and the cost is very
trifling. Use historical cards. Take, if you so desire, the card
containing the "Liberty Bell," and preach upon the text of the Bell:
"Proclaim liberty throughout the land." Describe the bell, give its
history in a few words. The seasonal post-cards, Christmas, Spring,
Winter, Thanksgiving, Hallowe'en, etc., give a new meaning to these
days, and tell things the children should know about them.
Use beautiful post-cards. Select some beauty spot in your own country
and explain what makes it beautiful and what makes its beauty worth
while to us. Use post-cards that have a children's story connected
with them, such as "The Lighthouse-keeper's Daughter, Grace Darling,"
"The Boy Lincoln and His Log-cabin Home," "George Washington and the
Cherry Tree." These pictures are running over with simple truth.
Use curious post-cards, such as of the Natural Bridge in Virginia,
cave pictures, the gold-fields of Alaska. Tell them of the Natural
Bridge as the work of God, and of the other bridge God made, a Bridge
from Calvary to heaven, the Bridge of the Cross.
Select foreign post-cards. This will enable you to tell missionary
stories about the people who live in those lands. Pictures of idols
will help you to cause the children to want to tell the heathen
children the story of the true God.
Select religious post-cards. Reproductions of the great works of art
can be secured. Di Vinci's "Last Supper" is a good one to select. You
can tell about the face of Judas and that of Christ being taken from
the same living model. The face of Judas was the disfigured face of
Jesus which had become repulsive because of the presence of sin. This
is what sin will do for a face.
Select picture-cards of Bethlehem, and tell the story of the town as
it now is, and as it was in David's time, and in the time of Jesus.
It would be but small trouble to make a course of eight short sermons
or more, using post-cards.
Urge the children to put the cards thus received in a little book,
and put under each card the date you preached the sermon. If any
child who attends regularly is absent mail a card to them the next
day, with a short lesson written on the card. Children always like
the postman to bring them something by mail. If they are out of town,
find their address and send it to them. If they "just did not come,"
say to them that some Sunday morning if they will call to see you,
you will give them the card they missed. It will give you a chance
for a pleasant word with them. It often goes a long way with little
folks. On the last Sunday of the course bring your full line of cards
you have used, and have a short review and ask some questions about
each card. This is only another, but a new, way of preaching to the
wonder eyes of the wonderful folks we call our children.
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