Teaching Our Children a Different Kind of Power on Palm Sunday

Palm Sunday can feel a little disorienting.

One minute, we’re waving branches and shouting “Hosanna!” and the next, we’re turned toward betrayal, violence, and the cross. It’s a lot to experience, especially if you’re worshipping with young children.

Jesus has already been teaching this alternative way in his ministry. In the Sermon on the Mount, he blesses the poor, the grieving, the peacemakers, the persecuted—the very people the world overlooks or dismisses. He talks about a kingdom where mercy matters more than victory, where love of neighbor (and even enemy) reshapes everything, where power isn’t something you cling to but something you give away.

And here’s the tension Palm Sunday asks us to sit with today. We join the crowd cheering on Jesus’ compassionate ministry with shouts of “Hosanna!” at the beginning of the service, but by the end of the hour, we have joined another crowd. One crying out, “Crucify him.”

It’s so uncomfortable, but it’s also so human. We know how easy it is to get swept up. To go along with the crowd or to stay quiet when something isn’t right. To choose what’s easy over what’s loving. To participate—intentionally or not—in systems that harm others.

Palm Sunday invites us to consider the kind of power we are teaching our children to trust and what we are teaching them to notice around them.

Are we forming them to believe that strength means winning, dominating, and coming out ahead? Or are we showing them that real strength looks like compassion, courage, and caring for others?

Are we helping them to notice how quickly love can turn to fear? How easily community can become mob (hello, middle school)? Are we laying the foundation that will help them choose the way of Jesus—choosing courage over comfort when deciding to do what’s right.

The pattern that plays out in Palm Sunday liturgies this morning wasn’t just something that happened in Jerusalem millenia ago. It’s still playing out in the world, and in us. Jesus rides into Jerusalem revealing a power that heals rather than a power that destroys. And this is the way we are invited to follow—together.

Maybe this week, try asking your children simple questions over dinner or at bedtime. Each night encouraging them a bit more to pay attention to what’s happening around them. Each night encouraging their own power to choose how to respond to what they see.

Where did you see kindness today?
Where did you see bravery today?
Where did you see someone being hurt or left out?
What could love look like in that moment?