170. Where Is the Baby?
In our family over many years as we set up the manger scene during Advent, we hid the baby Jesus, since from a logical point of view he would not be in the manger until Christmas morning. Sometimes I hid the baby. Sometimes one of my children would hide the baby. We started this tradition when we lived in an A-frame house in Pomona, NY and there was a year when someone hid the baby, and on Christmas morning had forgotten the hiding place. That made an interesting Christmas Day because every once in a while things came to a stop while we all hunted for Jesus. (I’ve always wondered if the person who bought that house ever found him.)
Seven or eight years ago I heard the story of another family who hadn’t observed that tradition and was setting up the manger scene. The mother came back to the livingroom to find the manger empty. A short while later she opened the bread box and found the baby there. She asked her nine-year-old. His explanation was simple: My teacher in Sunday School said that Jesus is the Bread of Life. I thought he shouldn’t be in the manger until Christmas so I put him in the bread box.
That solves the problem for me of not remembering. Now I put him in the kitchen drawer that would be the bread box if I actually kept bread there. Then I know where the baby is on Christmas Day. And actually on the day after Epiphany when I take decorations down, I put him back there until next Advent.
A poignant aside: I do the ordering for the World Mission Gift Shop at our church and much of it comes from an organization called SERRV. A few years ago SERRV changed its name to A GREATER GIFT and I have a little dark green box that holds the baby and proclaims on the outside of the box— A GREATER GIFT.
