It was 7 AM on Easter morning, at an outdoor Sunrise Service. Neither the place nor the time of day you would expect to see some children performing in a drama – but that was exactly what was unfolding. The costumes were transforming children into characters at the scene of that very first Easter morning. The limited amount of children awake and in attendance meant that the young cast only consisted of one soldier, two angels, three women and a disciple.
The soldier was first on the scene and assigned the boring task of guarding the tomb of a dead man. Thus, the young boy in soldier’s attire – complete with a Roman plumed helmet – was asked how he felt about being given such a seemingly unimportant task.
“Well…I have a paint brush on my head,” was his unexpected reply. What more could the audience expect at 7 AM?
As the “women” slowly approached the tomb from the far corners, our two young angelic beings were swooped onto the tomb scene. Paint-brush boy was instructed to fall down as if dead – which he did without reservation. Then, as the women drew near, the angels were instructed to say, “Why do you look for the living among the dead?” After two or three promptings, they finally whispered their line, but without much gusto.
Thus, their next prompt was stated like this, “Say, ‘He is risen’ loudly!”
Not having the advantage of years of grammatical training, the five-year-old angel exclaimed, “He is raisen!”
The eight-year-old angel, very wise for his age, said word for word what he had been told to say, “He is risen LOUDLY!”
Although the re-enactment may have varied quite a bit from the real occurrences of that first Easter morning, it was a beautiful reminder. Too often as we grow older, we become complacent and disinterested with the retelling of familiar stories – even such life-changing stories as the Resurrection. However, through the faith, enthusiasm and actions of a child, it can re-gain the freshness and excitement that it deserves.
Thank you for supporting the children of Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries and thereby giving them opportunities to develop that child-like faith that is so precious in God’s sight.
Related Stories View All
