The Shepherd's Bathrobe and Other Funny Christmas Stories for Church

Every church has the Christmas it plans, and then it has the Christmas that actually happens. These seven come from Mulberry Hill Community Church in Cobb’s Ferry, and each one is short enough to read aloud before the coffee gets cold.

The Shepherd’s Bathrobe

Every December, Bernice Oakley calls our house about the shepherds. She needs nine for the children’s pageant, and she has never once had nine bathrobes.

My husband Ferris’s brown plaid robe has been a shepherd since 1994. It has watched over its flocks by night on boys of every size. It has been tied with a jump rope, a necktie and, one memorable year, an extension cord.

This year Ferris grumbled. He said a man ought to be able to wear his own robe in his own kitchen on a cold morning.

“You’ll have it back January second,” Bernice said. “Same as always.”

On pageant night the littlest shepherd tripped on the hem, picked himself up, sniffed his sleeve and announced to the back row, “This smells like Mr. Ferris.”

Ferris sat up straighter than he has since our wedding. He has spent all week telling people at the hardware counter that his robe got a speaking part.

The lesson: Give what you have gladly, and God will find it a part to play. (2 Corinthians 9:7)

The Pink Candle Committee

The worship committee met three times in November about the Advent wreath. The question was whether the third candle should be pink or rose, whether there is a difference, and who decided.

Delphine Archer brought paint chips. Lowell Teague brought a hymnal supplement from 1962. Somebody brought lemon bars, which bought us forty minutes of peace.

By the third meeting we had a subcommittee, a motion on the floor and a substitute motion to table the first motion until the subcommittee reported.

Pastor Danforth finally cleared his throat and asked whether anyone had ordered the candles.

Nobody had.

On the first Sunday of Advent we lit a plain white emergency candle from the fellowship hall kitchen drawer. It smelled faintly of vanilla and was perfectly lovely.

The subcommittee is still meeting. I hear they’ve moved on to the wick.

The lesson: Don’t let the details of Christmas crowd out the Christ of Christmas. (Luke 10:41-42)

All Caught Up

Our grandson Tucker is seven and stayed with us the first weekend of December. His mother packed a cardboard Advent calendar with a chocolate behind each little door.

Sunday morning I found all twenty-four doors open and Tucker on the couch looking deeply at peace.

“Those were supposed to last until Christmas,” I said.

He explained that he was worried he might forget some days, so he got caught up ahead of time.

I was gathering myself for a fine speech about patience when Ferris spoke from behind the newspaper. He mentioned that a certain young lady once found her presents in her mother’s cedar closet, unwrapped every one and taped them back so badly her mother bought double tape the next year.

Tucker asked who it was.

Ferris turned a page. “Ask your grandmother. She’s all caught up.”

The lesson: God’s best gifts arrive right on time, and the waiting is part of the gift. (Galatians 4:4)

The Kettleworths of Laramie

For thirty-one years Ferris and I have sent a Christmas card to Dale and Norma Kettleworth of Laramie, Wyoming. For thirty-one years they have sent one back. Neither of us can remember who they are.

Ferris says they’re from my side. I say they camped next to us at a lake in 1993. Every December we talk about crossing them off, and every December one of us says, “Well, what if they’re sick?”

This year Norma’s card had a note. She’d turned seventy-five, her knees were behaving, and she hoped we were well.

Under that, in different handwriting, it said, “Dale asks if you could remind us how we know you.”

Ferris laughed so hard he had to sit down on the step stool.

I wrote back that we had no idea either, but we’d be delighted to go on not knowing them for another thirty years.

The lesson: Keep doing small kindnesses faithfully, even when you can’t remember how they started. (Galatians 6:9)

The Leaning Angel

The angel on top of our sanctuary tree has leaned to the left since roughly the Eisenhower years. Every December somebody climbs the ladder to straighten her, and by the next Sunday she’s tipped again.

The trustees have tried wire, florist tape and a clothespin. Lowell Teague once brought up a carpenter’s level. It is hard to argue with a level, but she managed.

This year the women’s circle got serious about buying a new one. Then Otis Freel, who has swept that sanctuary for twenty-six years, leaned on his push broom and asked if any of us had ever looked at which way she leans.

We looked. She was tipped, very sweetly, toward the little manger scene on the communion table.

“She’s not crooked,” Otis said. “She’s just looking at the baby.”

The lesson: What looks crooked to us may be pointing exactly where God wants us to look. (Proverbs 3:5-6)

The Man With the Extinguisher

At our Christmas Eve candlelight service, Royce Pembrook stands in the back with a fire extinguisher. He has done it for nineteen years. He doesn’t hold a candle and he doesn’t sing. He just watches two hundred people pass little flames down the pews during “Silent Night.”

This year a girl named Pearl, about six, turned around and asked him why he never sang.

“Somebody has to keep watch,” Royce whispered.

Pearl thought it over. “Jesus is keeping watch,” she said. “You can sing.”

So Royce set the extinguisher by the door, took a candle and sang. Every verse. With feeling. Royce has many gifts, and he used all of them except pitch.

Afterward our choir director, Marjorie Sills, thanked him warmly and asked whether he might consider keeping watch again next year.

The lesson: The Lord keeps watch over us, so we are free to lift our voices. (Psalm 121:4)

The Electric Blanket Swap

The women’s circle Christmas party has a gift swap where stealing is allowed. The limit is fifteen dollars, and nobody ever gets excited, except the year somebody brought an electric blanket with dual controls.

That blanket was stolen eleven times in one afternoon. Edna Voss, who taught half of Cobb’s Ferry to read, took it from her own sister-in-law without blinking. Women who had carried casseroles to each other through three funerals narrowed their eyes across the punch bowl.

When the last number was called, the blanket landed with Wilma Truesdale, who held it with a curious expression.

“I brought this,” she said. “It’s been in my hall closet since 2009. I never could figure out the controls.”

Edna, who had stolen it twice, sighed. “Neither can I. I just wanted to win.”

The lesson: Wanting what someone else has is cold comfort next to being content with what God has given. (Hebrews 13:5)

Merry Christmas from Cobb’s Ferry, where the angel still leans and the committee still meets.