Easter like I’ve not done before.

This past Sunday was Easter. But this year I wasn’t in the worship service. In fact originally I wasn’t even going to be in my church at all. Now before you start throwing all those left over beginning-to-spoil Easter Eggs, hold on a minute. My High School has their Annual Alumni Banquet every year on Easter weekend. This year my own class was even planning a get together. (More on that later, …maybe) :-) So I didn’t originally plan to be home for Easter Sunday. I made arrangements for others to handle children’s church in my absence. (It was my turn to have the class.) But the more I thought about it and the closer it came the more I “rebelled” at the idea of being “there” instead of “here.”

So at the last minute I decided to come back home Saturday night after our class get together and not stay for the banquet. Sunday morning came and Liz had done a wonderful job preparing for the class. The really young ones (2’s and 3’s) stayed in another class; the 4’s, 5’s and 6’s didn’t come in until the offering was being taken up in “big church.” Liz had a story to read – the Easter story, from a children’s book. Then there were the cookies to take home (after play time) that told the Easter story. When it was time to go home and all the toys were put away, I called all the children over to the story time corner. I thought maybe I could get them to quiet down while waiting for their parents. I had brought some plastic Easter eggs in case I needed to come with something myself. I had an idea.

I took one of these eggs to tell them a story. I had read this in an email forward and maybe you have too. I couldn’t remember all the details and some of the details I left out. (How much can a 5 year old understand about a child who is “slow” or “different” not to mention “mentally handicapped”?) But it was interesting to see how quiet they got.

The story was about a teacher who had asked her students to each bring something to school in an Easter egg that represented something special to them. Some brought the expected figures of their favorite pet or favorite toy. Some even brought things that represented Easter (bunny, candy…) to them. But one little boy did something different.

When it came time for “Peter” to show what he brought, all the eyes in the room were turned to him. When he opened his egg, the teacher, trying not to be shocked, wasn’t sure if he understood the assignment. You see, Peter’s egg was empty. Peter didn’t bring anything in his egg.

I asked the children what having an empty egg meant. One of the little darlings shot his arm in the air and said, “I know, because Jesus was risen, and ‘that place’ was empty.” But he wanted to know what a tomb was. I explained that it was like a cave, where they buried people like we do in graves today. Peter understood better than any one else what was the most important thing to him: an empty tomb (grave) on Easter morning. To Peter it was important that his egg be empty because the tomb was empty.

It was such a delight to see the eyes of these little ones light up as they put together the empty egg with the empty tomb.

I told them that later that day when they’ve emptied all their Easter eggs to remember what an empty egg stands for. If it wasn’t for the empty tomb we would be celebrating Easter. It’s not always what we have or are given but sometimes what we don’t have that is the most important. We don’t have a saviour who is still in the grave. It is empty. I think the children went home that day with a new understanding of Easter.

The lesson on the empty Easter egg, and the children’s looks on their faces, was probably a better sermon than what I “missed” in Big Church. This is one Easter I won’t forget.