A Christmas Pageant Story by Frédéric Dardant
Today the kids at the Epiphany Church told us a very interesting story. It appears that God, (we don’t know him but we talk about him a lot) decided to save the world. So He sent an angel (a beautiful one) to Mary, a young girl in Galilee to tell her that she will be bearing His Son. She was surprised. (Wouldn’t you be if God told you that you are going to be pregnant and “it’s MY BABY”.)
She said “yes”. It’s a good thing.
Now the problem is that Mary was engaged to a guy named Joseph, and he didn’t think that it was funny. So God had to send that beautiful angel again to clear his mind. But Joseph is a good guy, so he went along with this. Waving at the crowd, he looked like he was proud anyway.
Both he and Mary had to go to Bethlehem for some bureaucratic business. And she had the baby while they were staying in a stable. They did not have a reservation at the Holiday Inn, I guess.
That is the story that the kids performed.
The baby Jesus, (that is the name God wanted for him) did not adjust right away to being human so he had to be played by several stand-ins, one of which was a girl. (That should please the feminists, but God is not sexist.) Plus, we had a very productive “baby year” at the Church of the Epiphany.
Somehow the news spread quickly across the area (smoke signals, tom-tom drums, apparently they didn’t have smart phones). Mostly a bunch of cute and tiny angels went around telling the shepherds in the fields. So they went with their sheep, at least one, because they were curious. (I don’t know about you, but if an angel came to me to tell me to go check something out in a stable, I would go, plus it must be boring to watch sheep all day.)
We don’t know if they understood what was happening, but I am sure that it was worth being there (they didn’t take selfies as far as we know). It was good, and even the sheep behaved.
But that is not all. It was such a great event that the news of it traveled very, very, very far, and some wise fellows from very, very, very far, (possibly Loreauville or Jeanerette, maybe even St. Martinville) saw a star that was telling them to follow it. (I know that sounds far fetched, but that was what the kids said). They were kings but rumor has it that some of them used to be Shepherds, or even sheep (don’t ask me; I’m just reporting).
They came to the stable and brought some very impressive gifts. Probably Jesus didn’t think much of it as he (or she) was having trouble adjusting to becoming human, but I am sure that Joseph and Mary appreciated them.
That must be a true story, since the kids told it to us, and it is nice because it’s says that God loves us even though we can sometimes misbehave, and He is saving us.