4 ways to help your children understand the bigger story this Christmas

Dawn Kay shows how Christian parents can move beyond the basics of the nativity to reveal the full story of the coming saviour to their children this Christmas

I remember rushing out of school one day when my mum came to pick me up. “Guess what I’m playing in the Christmas play? The Christmas pudding!” Yep, my school had managed to include every child in their version of the Nativity.

Over the years, my own children have played shepherds, sheep, angels, innkeepers, kings, and eventually Mary. The nativity plays had titles like Whoops-a-Daisy Angel, The Landlord’s Cat, Tinsel and Tea Towels. I even wrote one myself—Christmas, the Prequel.

we can sometimes miss the beauty and rawness of a miracle birth

At the heart of it, all we are trying to do is find a modern way to retell one of the greatest stories of all time - the birth of Jesus Christ. But in our earnestness to ensure that we are presenting the story in a way that appeals to all and offends none, we can sometimes miss the beauty and rawness of a miracle birth. And how biblically accurate are our Christmas plays? Does it even matter if they aren’t?

The story of Jesus’ birth is told in two of the gospels, Matthew and Luke. Matthew, a Jew, wrote directly for the Jewish people, beginning with a genealogy to prove Jesus’ direct lineage from Abraham to the Messiah: all forty-two generations. Luke, the doctor, takes a more methodical approach, showing that Jesus is the saviour of the whole world. 

So what does the biblical text actually ……