Tag Archives: children

The Kingdom Belongs to Children

Max crouched down, squished himself in between two other six-year olds and waited eagerly, like a compressed spring about to uncoil, for his turn.  He looked up at his older cousin, Alexandra, and whispered, “What’s a sin?”

He was a little embarrassed and hoped no one other than Alexandra had heard him. She had seen what was going on between him and the other boy. She would understand that it wasn’t Max’s fault he hadn’t been completely listening to Miss Becca, his vacation Bible school teacher.

He thought it was nice that some of the married teachers, including Miss Becca, didn’t always want to be called Mrs. So-and-So. Miss Becca let you call her by her first name, as long as you added “Miss” beforehand. Max first met Miss Becca in church. She sat next to him a couple times during worship service, and every now and then she taught his Sunday school class. Max liked the way she paid attention to him when he talked with her. She looked him right in the eyes and didn’t seem bothered by any of his questions.

Today, she asked that everyone call her Lady Becca. All the lady teachers, the girls, and she were strolling around like royalty, with their chins up and heads high. When she spoke, she didn’t pronounce words like she normally did. Everything she said seemed more proper and formal, and to top that off, she taught the boys how to bow and the girls how to curtsy.

“Too bad for them,” Max thought. Bowing was so much better. It didn’t require practice like the girls were doing. Boys were way more cool. They could pretend to be brave knights defending a kingdom. He was glad that his mom knew about the medieval theme and let him take a toy sword to the summer program. Swords weren’t normally allowed at church. Max figured this week would be fun.

When Lady Becca had explained what a sin was, Max was distracted by his new friend, Aidan, who kept trying to take Max’s sword away from him. “Just for a minute,” Aidan had pleaded, but Max knew better than to give up his plastic weapon. He might never get it back! It was no wonder he missed some of what his teacher had said. He was lucky just to have caught the most important part: only one person in all of history has never sinned. “But what exactly are my sins?” he silently worried.

Without hesitating, Alexandra simultaneously answered the question he asked out loud and the one he was thinking. She said, “A sin is anything you do that’s wrong.”

“Thanks, Alex,” he softly replied.

Alexandra preferred to be called “Alex.” That’s what her mom called her, what her dad called her, and what Max called her, usually. Alex was pretty smart…and she paid attention. Or, she paid attention…and was pretty smart. One way or another, she seemed to know about God’s son who came down from heaven to be with people. Alex was fourteen and old enough to be Lady Becca’s youth helper. All the teachers had at least one of the older kids to help teach the younger children about the stories in the Bible.

Lady Becca described Jesus as both God and man but a man like no other. She gave examples: He had never lied; never cheated; and never hit his brother, not even once. She said, “Lots of people liked Jesus because he was good at fixing things. Many people hated him because they didn’t know him very well.”

For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." Jesus' words as recorded in Mark 11:45 (NIV).    Photo by Kelly Bixby

“For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Jesus’ words as recorded in Mark 11:45 (NIV). Photo by Kelly Bixby

Alex added, “Other people had no feelings whatsoever about him, because they had never heard of him.”

Max took the piece of paper that Lady Becca held out to him. He noticed that it was shaped like a hand, so he held the paper up and compared it to his own. His palm fit inside the paper’s edges almost perfectly. It was as if Max had spread his fingers wide, plopped them upon a single sheet of paper, pencilled up and down, around and around, and then cut along all the lines to end up with the paper he was now holding. Max followed Lady Becca’s instructions and wrote his name in crayon on the front of it.

Lady Becca’s red velvet gown swept the floor as she continued moving about the room, passing from person to person, with the goal of giving everyone their own hand-shaped sheet of paper. She wore a stretchy silver fabric band around her head. It had one lone ruby-colored jewel in the center and wasn’t meant to look like a more elaborate, richly adorned crown. After all, she wasn’t “Queen Becca.” But she was dressed like someone who belonged in a castle.

When Lady Becca walked towards Lily, the tallest girl in the class, Max could see Lily’s eyes widen in anticipation. He didn’t think it was the paper she was excited about, however. He saw that she longingly eyed the bejeweled, golden scepter in Lady Becca’s left hand. The decorative staff was just slightly taller than Lily herself, who was about four-feet tall. Purple and gold ribbons streamed from the top of it to halfway down. Max guessed that each girl in the class was hoping for the opportunity to run around waving the fancy stick in the air and making the ribbons fly.

“Get rid of all the frilly stuff, and that stick just might come in handy,” Max muttered to himself. Then he heard the girls collectively sigh when their teacher tucked the prop under one arm so she could finish passing out sheets of paper.

Lady Becca said that everybody except Jesus sins. Max thought that didn’t make sense, because everybody knows the only things babies do are eat, sleep, cry and poop. Sometimes they smile too, but that’s just when they have gas. (He had heard that from Alex, who was too polite to say, “fart.”) How could they do anything wrong? They’re babies. Maybe Lady Becca didn’t know what she was talking about.

After thinking more about it, though, Max realized that Alex couldn’t be completely right either. Max was able to make Alex’s baby brother, Theo, smile just about any time Max tried. All he had to do was look Theo right in the eyes and make a big and wide smile first. A lot of times, he also made Theo giggle by doing that. There wasn’t gas at all.

It was nearly Max’s turn to stick his sheet of paper onto the Styrofoam cross that leaned against a makeshift wall inside the classroom. The paper was meant to represent one of Max’s sins, and the cross represented the real, wooden one Jesus died on. Around the top hung a crown of thorns similar to the one Roman soldiers had used to jab into Jesus’ head to torture him and make fun of him. This was serious.

Over 2,000 years ago, Jesus sacrificed himself so that people’s sins could be forgiven. Couldn’t God just change the rules? God can do anything He wants! Why did God want Jesus to die? Max was beginning to see how little he understood sin.

Max wasn’t quite certain if he was wrong by not sharing his sword with Aiden. “He should have brought his own. This one’s mine, and that kid might ruin it,” Max reasoned. Yet somehow, deep inside, he didn’t feel very good.

Max thought Aiden looked kind of sad. He remembered feeling that way himself just last week when Alex rode her bike over to visit. She brought an ice-cream sandwich. It was Max’s favorite and she knew it. She hadn’t given him even a tiny bite and ate the whole thing in front of him!

Lady Becca encouraged the class to study the Bible whenever they had questions about how God wants them to behave. She assured them that God wants what is best for them. She said, “God wrote a really long love note and sent his Word for all people. Sometimes it might seem confusing, but the more you read the Bible, the more you’ll come to understand how God wants you to live.”

Max thought, “Alex should take a look at what the Bible says about sharing.”

A moment later, Max surprised Aiden by lending him his sword. Then, the brave-hearted knight, Sir Max, approached the cross and let Jesus take away his sin.

No Greater Gift

Stained glass depiction of Joseph's encounter with God's angel. The Church of St. Joseph, Nazareth, Israel. 2014.

Stained glass depiction of Joseph’s encounter with God’s angel. The Church of St. Joseph, Nazareth, Israel. 2014.

“I’ve got pageant on the brain.” It’s a temporary affliction that I most recently revealed to my friends one evening while we were playing Euchre. The conversation had been swimming around careers and responsibilities, and at some point I squeezed in my earth-shattering news: I’m directing the Christmas pageant at my church and am preoccupied with the planning.

Two years ago, I took on the endeavor for my first time. When I told one of my best friends, she surprised me by laughing. So much for the vote of confidence, I thought. Then, I realized that she grew up with me and she remembered what I was like as an adolescent. Back then, I hated speaking in public, was never in a play, and quit going to church sometime during high school. Upon reflection, her reaction seemed somewhat appropriate, except a lot had happened since our childhood. Little by little, God had prodded me until my faith had grown strong enough that I could be trusted with telling His story.

I knew organizing the pageant would be a huge responsibility. Parents wanted to see their children participate in an appropriate demonstration that would honor Jesus. Children expected to have fun while being part of an important presentation. And God seemed to be nudging me to deliver the pageant in a way that would help others appreciate the unique circumstances surrounding His Son’s birth.

Did I understand the historical event well enough to accurately portray Jesus’s entry into the world? Not entirely. But I have heard it said that if you really want to learn something, then you should teach it to someone else. Since I would be doing both, I felt obligated to look for reliable information. I consulted several different sources, sifted through books and articles, garnered what I needed, and wrote the script for The Story of Jesus’s Birth. The pageant was introduced to my congregation as the “Authentic Christmas” story because I hoped to do away with many common misconceptions and show people a more realistic rendition of the miraculous event that took place over 2000 years ago.

I didn’t want to rewrite history, but I found many tidbits that warranted my tweaking of the traditional Christmas pageant. Here are some of the things I found interesting and the ideas that took shape.

Jesus fulfilled more than three hundred prophecies, an astounding number considering they were written over four hundred years before He was born. His birth, life, and sacrificial death were foretold well before he walked the earth. His role as savior was long expected.

Stone feeding trough. Photograph taken by Kelly Bixby in Megiddo, Israel. 2014.

Stone feeding trough. Photograph taken by Kelly Bixby in Megiddo, Israel. 2014.

Joseph’s arrival back in his hometown of Bethlehem for the census may have been similar to our modern day experiences of going home for a holiday. Sometimes we have to sleep on the couch because Auntie Em is in the spare bedroom. It doesn’t mean we can’t stay; we just get whatever space is still left. The familiar misconception of a callous innkeeper may have evolved from nothing more than a tired and grumpy cousin who didn’t get to sleep in his own bed one special night. The place offered to Mary and Joseph could have been the only room of his house that wasn’t already overflowing with relatives and other guests. It would have been the lower portion of the resident’s home (a multi-level cave) where valued animals were routinely brought inside at night. There they were safely protected from loss and theft while the owners slept in an upper room. No one really knows if any animals were present and lying near the baby Jesus on the night of His arrival, but there is evidence that Jesus’s bed was a stone feeding trough, not a wooden manger, built into the lower room.

Under normal circumstances in ancient Israel, Joseph wouldn’t have been in the room when Mary gave birth. He would have remained close by and quick to enter after Jesus was cleaned and swaddled.

Below the ornamentation and decorative tapestries is the ground of a cave presumed to be the birthplace of Jesus. The Church of the Nativity, Bethlehem, Israel. 2014.

Below the ornamentation and decorative tapestries is the ground of a cave presumed to be the birthplace of Jesus. The Church of the Nativity, Bethlehem, Israel. 2014.

There isn’t any biblical mention of angels being present in the stable when Jesus was born (despite artistic renderings and popular crèches), but they are part of the story. First, the angel Gabriel appeared to Mary to tell her she would conceive the Son of God and that her old and barren relative, Elizabeth, was also pregnant (with John the Baptist). Then, an angel, presumed to be Gabriel, appeared in a dream to Joseph to explain that Mary’s conception was miraculous. God’s messenger instructed Joseph to name the expected baby Jesus. On the night Jesus was born, a single angel–once again presumed to be Gabriel– appeared to shepherds to announce Jesus’s birth and encourage them to go to Bethlehem and see the baby. A host of angels joined Gabriel and the shepherds, praised God, and proclaimed peace to those who please God. Joseph was visited at least two more times by angels giving warning or instructions that led to Jesus’s safety.(NIV)

Jesus was officially given His name during the time of circumcision, when He was eight days old.(NIV)

When Jesus was no younger than forty days old, He was taken to the temple to be presented to the Lord and dedicated into serving Him. During the ceremony, Jesus created quite a stir when two faithful servants recognized the infant as the Messiah (Christ). Simeon prophesied Jesus’s suffering and death, and old Anna, a prophetess, spread the news of the infant Messiah’s arrival to those looking forward to redemption.(NIV)

Wise men, commonly referred to as Magi, came to worship Jesus, but not on the night of His birth. Their visit may have taken place as long as two years afterwards. So in our pageant, the unnamed Magi from the east humbly bowed before a toddler Jesus as He stood beside his mother in their home, not a stable. The visitors were most likely not kings, but they may have been astrologers or advisors to kings. There was more than one Magi, but the Bible doesn’t specify the exact number. Tradition, whether right or wrong, sets the number at three.

Jesus was taken to safety in Egypt, thus spared from paranoid King Herod’s orders to massacre all the boys in Bethlehem who were two years old and younger. This tragedy is pretty well known, but it is often left out of Christmas pageants. One reason is that this tale is gruesome and unsettling. Even I glossed over sharing this part of history because the pageant was ending and I wanted a softer transition into a joyous closing hymn. I would have liked to have explained that more than baby boys would have been killed. In their fury, it’s presumed that Herod’s army didn’t take time to figure out which babies were boys and which were girls; and if parents tried to protect their children, they may have been killed too.

Scene from “The Story of Jesus’s Birth.” Photograph taken by Lynn Rife. 16 Dec. 2012

Scene from “The Story of Jesus’s Birth.” Photograph taken by Lynn Rife. 16 Dec. 2012

Overall, our pageant looked fairly traditional. Youth portrayed every part. They became fluffy sheep, brilliant angels, and humble shepherds. As wise men, they looked like kings, complete with two-legged camels trailing behind. The highlight was still the scene with a costumed donkey that came to rest next to Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus. Did anyone notice the non-traditional yet more realistic stone manger? Was anyone surprised to learn about Simeon and Anna? Or that Jesus was at least two years old when the Magi bowed before Him? I had achieved my goal of introducing lesser known details into our rendition of the Christmas story. I hoped that many were inspired to wonder what that night was really like.

The pageant required long hours of planning and the support of a small army of family and friends. Together, we survived the crazy, energetic practices and embraced impromptus by our young actors. There were tears (mine) during group prayer and joy as I watched God’s precious children welcome and worship baby Jesus. The parents smiled. The children beamed. I was amazed by it all and felt like the one who had the most fun.

“Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these.” –Jesus


SOURCES:

Bart D. Ehrman, “The Myths of Jesus,” Newsweek 17 Dec. 2012: 26-28.

Bert Gary, “Are Kids’ Christmas Plays Biblical?” downloaded Nov. 2012 <http://bertgary.blogspot.com/2009/01/are-kids-christmas-plays-biblical.html>.

Daniel B. Wallace, “The Birth of Jesus Christ,” Bible.org downloaded 7 Nov. 2012 <https://bible.org/article/birth-jesus-christ>.

The NIV Study Bible, ed. Kenneth Barker (Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, 1995) 1436-1439, 1533-1538.