Robin’s Christmas Song: encountering Jesus through a bird’s eye view of the nativity

Tell us the inspiration behind the story to Robin’s Christmas Song. 

There are a couple of inspirations. 

Of course, the first is the Bible! Some 15 years ago at church, I was reading through the passages of Luke and I realised that they’re written in such a poetic way, that they’re not just poems, they’re songs. They’re people speaking or singing out in praise to Jesus. And I realised there’s loads of it around Jesus’ birth. There’s no other event in the Bible where everyone just keeps bursting into these poetic outbursts of praise. 

I then get this job with Scripture Union and they haven’t had a new Christmas book for years, so the very first thing I do is I have to write a Christmas book. The pressure felt quite big, but then a friend sent me a book that she’d written about a musical instrument. As I was giving her feedback, I got in the groove of being creative and I remembered this recollection from years ago, how there’s loads of singing at Jesus’ birth. Then I thought, “Why not?” 

There’s no other event in the Bible where everyone just keeps bursting into these poetic outbursts of praise. 

What would be the best way to communicate this? The songs themselves are not very child friendly. So, wouldn’t it be cool to tell the story through the eyes of songbirds? We have so many of them and, during the pandemic, I quite often sat and did birdwatching using an app called Merlin Bird ID. I’d put that on and it would tell me all these different songbirds in my garden. 

A fascination with songbirds and a fascination with the Bible - that’s the inspiration.

In terms of context and age group, who is the book aimed at?

I’d say ages four to eight, but children are different, so it could appeal to those a little older, too.

Robin’s Christmas Song is more than just a book. Tell us about the other resources connected to it.

There’s an activity sheet and a response sheet so that a child, after reading it, can have some fun while exploring their own response to Jesus. It can be used in a family, school, church or any kind of outreach setting. 

For those involved in schools, there’s some suggestions on how you can build an assembly or lesson plan around the book and activity sheets. 

There’s also something for church services. We put together some really fun ideas on how you can base a church service around the songs, including a drama and an animated video. 

And there’s one really fun idea I like because, if you’ve ever noticed, the Magi only appear in Matthew. They don’t appear in Luke. If you’re writing a Christmas book that is based on the songs in Luke, the Magi aren’t part of that. They’re not in this book. But we thought, wouldn’t it be quite fun if, during a Christmas service, to have people dressed up as the Magi who keep trying to come on stage but keep being told, “No, it’s not your turn.” Then, at the end of the service, you can use that as an invitation to people to come back – because there’s more to the story. That’s the main thing about Christmas: how do we encourage people to come back to the next thing — whether that’s a church service, an Alpha course, or whatever?

There are loads of books, activities, videos and resources available for children at Christmas. What makes Robin’s Christmas Song different?

That was the challenge, because I do not like reinventing the wheel. There’s a couple of things that make this different. 

First, focusing on the fact that after 400 years of silence, Jesus bursts onto the scene and provokes this praise response. That’s not something that I’ve seen focused on in Christmas books – they often just tell the story. Whereas Robin’s Christmas Song is getting children to notice that there is a response to Jesus. At the end, there’s space to do this.

There probably were robins around at the birth of Jesus – that’s the kind of plausible but fictional aspect to the story.

The other thing is that it blends fact and fiction. There probably were robins around at the birth of Jesus – that’s the kind of plausible but fictional aspect to the story. Of course, that’s not unique, but it’s not the norm. It’s a way that helps children enter into a story and identify with a character in it, because it’s hard to identify with Mary, a shepherd or a wise man from afar. But children tend to identify quite easily with animal characters.

The other cool thing I love is that the illustrator loved birds, and she really tried hard to make them as lifelike as possible.  

It must have been fun writing the story and bringing the book together. What was the experience like?

I went to my favourite forest nearby called Ecclesall Woods and I actually saw a robin at one point. I then saw another bird that I didn’t recognise. It turned out to be a song thrush, which was very cool. It felt like little confirmation from God.

I got a couple of people to edit it. One person gave some really lovely ideas and somebody else helped me to hone the rhymes. With the illustrator, I really encouraged her to use her imagination. I said, “You’ve got the Holy Spirit living in you. Just go for it.” She came up with some really lovely ideas.

I’m really hoping children will suddenly encounter Jesus, as if they’ve encountered Him for the first time.

What impact are you hoping the story will have?

A couple of things. One is that children who are not familiar with the story of Jesus will find it really interesting. But mostly, I’m hoping it will help children to see the birth narrative of Jesus as if they’re reading it for the very first time. When you read something for the first time, it usually impacts you differently, doesn’t it? I’m really hoping children will suddenly encounter Jesus, as if they’ve encountered Him for the first time.

You can order your copy of Robin’s Christmas Song from Scripture Union for £7.99 and read Joanne’s articles for NexGen.