Teaching Tip of the Week

1/25/99
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You’re Joking!

Children love riddles and jokes, and they can be effective as introductions to Bible lessons, memory verses, songs or just about any part of day’s agenda.

Once, as an introduction to a lesson on trusting God, I told the following joke: (stop me if you've heard it.)

A man walking along a cliff suddenly slipped and fell over the edge. Fortunately, he was able to grab onto a branch on the way down, but now he was in a situation where he couldn’t get back up and was still high above the ground. He looked up and cried, “Is anybody up there?”
“Yes, I’m up here.”
“Who are you?”
“I’m God. I can help you if you just trust me.”
“Sure, what do you want me to do?”
“Just let go of the branch and everything will be O.K.”
There was a pause. The man looked down. He looked up again.

“Is there anybody else up there?”

A good joke that makes a point related to your main truth is especially effective in capturing the attention of the children and, on top of that, is also enjoyable and memorable.

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