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35. Improvised Live Nativity - Wednesday Morning · Family Prayer Podcast

• 0:00
  Good morning, Grace Harbor!
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  It’s Dan, and it is CHRISTMAS EVE!
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  What an exciting day!
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  It’s one of my busier days, but it’s also one of my favorite days
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  of the whole year.
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  And that’s because the Christmas Eve church service
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  is probably my favorite service we do all year.
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  One of my favorite parts of the service is the improvised live nativity.
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  Do you know what that is?
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  Let’s break it down.
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  Nativity is one of the titles for the story of Jesus’ birth.
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  Maybe you’ve seen a nativity set with figures that show Mary
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  and Joseph and the baby Jesus, the shepherds, an angel or two,
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  and sometimes the Wise Men - even a few animals.
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  We actually have one where the characters from Charlie
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  Brown are dressed up like characters in the Bible story.
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  Snoopy is a sheep!
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  Well, a live nativity is when real people do what the Charlie
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  Brown characters do - dress up in costumes to help tell the story.
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  But the extra wrinkle we add is that it’s an *improvised* live nativity.
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  “Improvised” means we make it up as we go along.
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  There are no assigned parts, and there have been no rehearsals.
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  We have a whole bunch of costumes available, and as people arrive,
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  they can volunteer to play the parts.
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  Because it’s improvised and no one prepares ahead of time,
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  it never goes perfectly.
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  Sometimes people miss the cue to enter, or they stand in the wrong place.
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  One year, one of our shepherds was a younger boy,
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  and he quit halfway through because he got bored.
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  He just laid down
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  his staff, took off his costume, and walked back to sit with his family.
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  It was hilarious!
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  And believe it or not, that’s exactly why we do an improvised live nativity.
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  We don’t want it to be perfect.
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  An imperfect nativity where people aren’t sure where to go
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  or what to do and are surprised by the things that happen
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  - that’s about as true to the real thing as you can get!
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  You see, God knew what was coming on Christmas,
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  and an angel gave Mary and Joseph a little bit of a heads up,
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  but for the most part, it was all a huge surprise!
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  When Mary and Joseph showed up in Bethlehem,
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  is there a nice hotel room waiting for them? No!
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  In fact, there was no room for them at all in the place
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  they had planned to stay, so they ended up with the animals.
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  Then when Jesus, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, is born
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  is there anyone around ready to throw a royal birthday party?
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  Again - no!
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  In fact, the first people God invited to meet
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  Jesus were a bunch of shepherds - who lived outside,
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  smelled terrible, and, as you can imagine, weren’t very popular.
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  But it is *exactly* what God meant to do.
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  If the good news of Jesus’ birth means something
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  to the lowest of the low, then it means something to everyone!
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  And then we
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  have the Wise Men, who we sometimes we call the Three Kings.
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  When they see the newborn baby Jesus, these powerful and respected people
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  fall to their knees to worship him and give him very valuable gifts.
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  You see, the Christmas story is super familiar for a lot of us,
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  which can sometimes make us miss just how surprising it all was!
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  And that’s got me thinking… when we practice setting our intentions
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  on a day like Christmas Eve, it’s easy to think about familiar things first.
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  We plan to have fun.
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  We plan to finish wrapping presents.
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  We plan to eat some cookies.
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  Maybe some of you are planning to go to a Christmas Eve service in your town.
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  But, what if we made our goal today
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  keeping our eyes open for ways God can still surprise us?
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  Take a few moments as a family
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  and share a time when you were surprised by something good.
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  Maybe it was a surprise dessert, a surprise visit from a friend,
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  or a surprise win by your favorite sports team.
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  When we remind ourselves that these kinds of things happen,
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  we can look forward in hope to even more surprises!
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  If you need more time, you a pause the podcast and I’ll be right
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  here when you get back.
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  What a fun way to start Christmas Eve, right?!
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  You never know what God is going to do,
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  but we can be sure it will always be full of love.
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  Let’s close in prayer.
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  As always, you can close your eyes and fold your hands, but it’s
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  Christmas Eve, so I suspect
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  there will be some wiggle prayers going on this morning.
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  Dear God, we thank you for the parts of the Christmas story we know and love,
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  and we thank you for the parts that can still surprise us.
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  Keep our eyes open to see where you might still surprise us today.
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  Amen. Okay, Grace Harbor!
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  Go have an amazing Christmas Eve, and I’ll talk to you tonight.