Eight-year-old Joey lived in a low income housing development in Southern California. Church buses made periodic runs through his neighborhood to gather children for Sunday School and other special events.
Nice people invited him to a party at their church. But he only had 15 minutes to get dressed before the bus left. Joey ran home and exploded with excitement to his mother. “There’s a party at that big church this afternoon, and I’m invited, like at school a few months ago.
It was an early season Christmas party, and his family never had enough money to really celebrate holidays. So he assumed it was a Halloween or Thanksgiving party.
He went to work on an outfit. Fifteen minutes wasn’t much time, and their funds were even more limited than their minutes. He rummaged around and thought, “Why not go as a haystack?” He took his old brown sweater and stuffed it with weeds. He even put some of the straw on the outside of the sweatshirt just to make it look more real.
Poor Joey was more than surprised when the party turned out to be a Christmas play, not a costume party. Embarrassed, he hung around the fringes of the group. Then he heard one of the leaders say they couldn’t find the manger.
“Can I help?” He asked. “I’m good at finding things.” The leaders explained to Joey that what they were looking for was a box full of hay where baby Jesus could be laid. It seemed that someone had borrowed with the one the church used each year. How could they have a Bethlehem drama without it?
Forgetting his embarrassment, Joey, now feeling very resourceful, looked down at his costume: baggy brown sweatshirt with weeds stuffed in it and straw sticking out everywhere. “I could be a box of hay” He lay down on the floor and announced, “I’ll be your manger. Let Jesus be born in me!”
Let Jesus be born in me, too, oh God!

“I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 18:3-4) NIV

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