Wittenberg Gate

Christina and Her Brother (A Good Friday Gospel Presentation for Children)

Christina had been a very bad little girl. She sat on her bed and hugged her pillow. She was in big trouble and she knew it. What she had done was so bad that I will not mention it. Just think of the worst thing you have ever done, then double it, and you will have some idea.

Christina had been planning on having a great weekend. Do you know how it is when you have your mother or father all to yourself and you can just talk--about anything--for a really long time? Christina was looking forward to a time like that. Her mother was going to visit her sister, Christina's Aunt Lizzie, in another town. Aunt Lizzie had a daughter, Molly, who was Christina's age. Christina loved playing with her cousin Mollie. On the long car ride to Aunt Lizzie's house, Christina and her mother would talk and talk.

Mother would be angry with Christina now, though, and that car ride would not be very nice at all. Maybe her mother wouldn't even let her go. She would surely be punished. Christina didn't even want to look at her mother, because she knew what she had done would hurt her. She just wanted to hide. She was so ashamed of herself. She hugged her pillow tighter and began to cry.

"What's wrong, Chris?" Christina's brother walked into the room. "Are you sick?"

Christina told her brother all about what she had done. She told him how she had been looking forward to the weekend with Mom, but now she would surely be punished. Maybe she wouldn't be able to go at all.

"I'll tell you what," said her brother. "I will take your punishment for you. Then Mom will be angry at me and I will take the punishment, and you can stop feeling guilty and enjoy Mom's company, and go on your trip."

"What are you saying? How could that work?" asked Christina.

"I will work it out with Mom. She will agree, and you will be free."

"Why would you do that?" Christina asked.

"Because I love you, and I want you to enjoy your time with Mom." Her brother patted her on the head.

"How can I pay you back? she asked.

"You don't have anything I'd want," he laughed. "Just call it grace. Just love me back." Her brother left the room and went to find their mother.

Christina did love her brother, but this was too good to be true. How could one person take punishment for another person?

Christina and her mother did go on the trip that weekend. When Christina saw her mother, she said how sorry she was for what she had done. Mother was cheerful. "That's already taken care of," she said. "I am glad you're sorry, but we needn't worry about that any more." She smiled. "Where do you think we should stop for lunch?"

Christina soon felt easy again. She and her mother talked and talked about just about everything.

Don't you think Christina had a wonderful brother? He always wanted the best for Christina, and he wanted her to have a good relationship with her mother, too. He was willing to do whatever had to be done to make things right for Christina.

This story about Christina is a picture of what Jesus does for His people. Jesus is God the Son and He wants us to have a good relationship with God the Father, but our sin gets in the way. If I asked everyone who had never done anything wrong to raise their hands, the only people who would raise their hands would be liars, because everyone has done wrong! Of course, God is perfectly good, and He cannot just excuse our sin. He has to punish us for it. Jesus loves His people so much, that He was willing to do whatever had to be done to save us from our punishment and set us free to enjoy God.

Today we celebrate a holiday we call Good Friday. On that day we remember the Friday when Jesus died. You might wonder why we would call the Friday Jesus died good. What could be so good about that? When Jesus died, He was taking punishment for other people. He was whipped and beaten and accused of many bad things. Then He was nailed to a cross as punishment, and there He died. What is so good about that is that now His people are free! We don't have to be ashamed any more. We don't have to hide from God. We can enjoy Him forever.

Of course we have trouble believing that. We think that we have to do something to deserve such a gift, but we cannot pay Jesus back. We can only love Him.

This story has even a better ending, because two days after Jesus died, He came alive again! He rose up, came out of His tomb, and visited many people He had known. This is what we remember when we celebrate Easter.  We remember how Jesus came alive again after He was dead. Then, one day, Jesus rose up and went to heaven. That is where He is now. He is with God the Father and He prays for us. He also sends the Holy Spirit of God to be with us and to help us. The Holy Spirit helps us to love God and to do a better job of obeying Him. You might say He gives us a new heart. We can never learn all there is to know about God, but He did give us a book, the Bible, that tells us many things. The Holy Spirit that Jesus sends can help us to understand the Bible, too.

When God looks at us now, He does not see our sin. That is already taken care of, because Jesus took the punishment for us. He sees us as good. We can pray to God and talk about anything. We can tell Him when we are sorry. We can tell Him when we are happy or sad, and we can ask Him for the things we need. We can ask Him to help us to be good.

One day Jesus will come back again. Then there will be a new heaven and a new earth and God and His people will all live together in peace. Then we will be able to live without ever doing anything wrong. Won't that be wonderful?

So what can we do to pay Jesus back for doing all these things? We cannot pay Him back. We can only love Him.

Baking Cookies

"Momma, if God can do anything He wants, just by the power of His word, why does He call us to work for Him?"

"Do you remember when you made chocolate chip cookies all by yourself for the first time?"

"Yes, it was when Gramma and Grampa were coming to dinner. Was I six years old?"

"That's right. You started by reading the recipe."

"You had to help me. Remember I asked you what sue-gar was?"

"Yes, we had a good laugh at that one, didn't we?"

"I remember when I had to cream the butter and the sugar and it was too stiff for me to stir it."

"I helped you with that."

"You helped me measure everything, too, and you helped me put the cookies on the tray."

"You were afraid of the heat of the oven, so I put the cookies in for you."

"You took them out, too, and helped me put them on the cooling racks."

"And then when we served the cookies to Gramma and Grampa, what did you say?"

"I said I made the cookies! But I didn't, did I?"

"Well, you did make them, but I helped."

"I guess I should have said you helped. I couldn't have done it without you."

"Do you think it would have been easier for me to make the cookies myself?"

"I suppose it would have been much easier."

"Then why do you think I asked you to make the cookies?"

"I guess because you wanted me to learn from it."

"Yes, that's part of it. What else?"

"You knew I would enjoy it."

"How do you mean?"

"You knew I would like working next to you in the kitchen, because I love you. You knew I would like making something for Gramma and Grampa because I love them. You knew I would like taking part in making dinner for them because that was a happy day."

"Anything else?"

"Well, I guess I should admit that I enjoyed being able to brag that I had made them."

"Of course you did. There is great satisfaction in a job well done."

"But I should have said how much you helped."

"It would have been thoughtful to do so, but I would never have expected a six-year-old to think that way very often. I was willing to share the credit with you and have your grandparents admire your good work."

"So, what you are saying is that God is like that, too?"

"Yes, He is. He gives us good works to do because He loves us just as I love you--only far better. He knows that we will learn by doing good works, and we will love doing them, because we love Him and will love being a part of His work. He knows it would be easier just to do things Himself, and He knows He shares a bit of His glory with us when He lets us participate, but He is pleased to do it."

"He loves us very much, doesn't He?"

"Yes He does. Even more than I love you, which is an awful lot. Remember, I don't love you because you made cookies. I gave you cookies to bake because I love you. God doesn't love us because of good things we do, He gives us good things to do because He loves us."

"But we still should remember to thank Him and acknowledge that we couldn't do anything without His help."

"Indeed we should."

⁸For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God,  ⁹not a result of works, so that no one may boast.  ¹⁰For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. (Ephesians 2:8-10)

¹³...for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure. (Philippians 2:13)

Bible quotations from the English Standard Version.

tables turned

e e cummings in life the rebel
now
                            in death
spirit possessing the masses

savorer of rebellion
now
                            the norm
squirming in fashionable discomfort

for i frumpy housewife
now
                            the rebel
wielding SHIFT KEY and semicolon

He Calls Me His Brother

     Thomas was well-known as a scholar, a gifted teacher, and a talented playwright. He had the respect of the townspeople and was often called upon to help settle disputes or solve pressing problems. Noble families sent their sons to him to prepare them for the University. When learned men came to town, it was expected that Thomas would entertain them with his generous hospitality, and offer his home for use as a lecture or banquet hall. He had hosted philosophers, poets, scientists, and theologians.

     It did not hurt Thomas' reputation that he had been educated in the palace alongside the king's own sons. Thomas' father had been the king's butler, and the generous king had provided an education in the palace school to the children of all his servants. What was not well known was that Thomas had been a lazy student and that he had left the palace after his involvement in an incident of dishonesty had been discovered.

     Thomas knew he profited from his close ties to the palace and was ashamed of his own hypocrisy. He lived with the fear that some day someone who knew the whole story would reveal the shameful details and his reputation would be ruined.

 

The Parable of the Legalistic Steward

The owner of an orchard left instructions for his steward, "Do not allow anyone to pick fruit from the tree in the center of the orchard while I am away on my journey."

The steward thought how best to follow these instructions. He decided to make a sign to post near the tree. It read, "Do not pick fruit from this tree."

The next day the steward went out to survey the orchard. He saw several children playing tag around the tree, and one little boy sitting on one of the low-reaching branches. The steward was alarmed, "Children! Away! We must not disturb the fruit of this tree!"

The steward decided to build a fence around the tree and he hung a sign on it that read, "Do not go inside the fence."

The next day, as the steward surveyed the orchard, he found a worker leaning against one of the fence's posts as he rested from his work. A branch from the tree hung over the fence near the worker's head. The steward was alarmed, "Get away from there! We must not touch this tree!"

The steward decided to build another fence around the first one, and he hung a sign on it that read, "Do not touch the fence."

The next day, as the steward surveyed the orchard, he saw the workers picking fruit from trees near the fence. As he watched, an apple fell from one of the trees and landed inside the outer fence. The steward was alarmed, "Go pick elsewhere! We must not risk touching the fence!"

The steward decided to send the workers home and close the gates to the orchard.

The next week the owner of the orchard returned from his journey. He found his gates closed, his workers gone, and unpicked fruit hanging from his trees. "What have you done?" he asked his steward. "My fruit should have been picked by now, yet the harvest is rotting in the branches!"

"I was trying to keep the workers from touching the fence that surrounded the fence that surrounded the tree whose fruit we were not to pick."

"Oh foolish steward! I only sought to preserve the fruit from one tree so that when I returned from our journey we would have it to enjoy at our harvest celebration. Now we have no harvest to celebrate!"

In his zeal for the law, the fool adds to the law, and makes vain what was perfect.