by Stephanie McAdams
I have had the privilege of helping the elementary children of Lighthouse participate in our annual LBC Christmas Concert for the past few years. If you have ever attended one of these concerts, you would have a hard time forgetting the youngest performers of the night. Arrayed in costumes appropriate for Luke 2:8-14 or matching scarves and jingle bell bracelets, all you may see are smiling faces and perfected hand motions (just kidding, we are thankful when they all just start and end together with no one falling off the stage!). If you are curious about what happens behind the scenes of our performances, read on!
As a Sonlight (Sunday children’s ministry) staff, we desire to use any opportunity to share God’s character and Word with these children, emphasizing Jesus Christ. Every Sunday, through messages, small group discussion times, side conversations, and even game times, we believe that the children can learn what it means to be a true Christian from what they see and hear. So planning, practicing, and performing for the concert is no different! If lengthening the Christmas Concert or seeing cute kids on stage for pure entertainment were the only reasons for the children to participate in the concert, I would hesitate to organize a performance. But every year, without fail, God has shown me that He can use this precious time to exalt and exult His precious Son and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
Planning
As our annual Fall Festival (Halloween alternative) came to a close, I began to think of how the children could contribute to the Christmas Concert. In the past, we’ve acted biblical passages, sang songs with and without hand motions, made a video, you name it! This year, we decided to sing “Hope Has Come” by Sovereign Grace Music with hand motions. I spent some time listening to the song on repeat every day and reading the song lyrics whenever I had a moment here and there. I tried to think of hand motions that would help the kids focus on and remember the meaning of the lyrics. Ask my husband, and he’ll testify to hearing me sing and do the hand motions in the car, during dinner, while trying to go to sleep, etc…I’m sure it stuck in his head, too.
Practicing
We spent about four weeks preparing for our performance. With the help of all the staff, we devoted the last 30 minutes of each Sunday to teaching the song and hand motions through repetition. It’s truly amazing how quickly kids can pick up tunes, lyrics, and hand motions… might I say even twice as fast as us adults?! We tried to explain each line of the lyrics, explaining big words like “alleluia”, how “Christ” is synonymous with “hope”, and to also tell them how each hand motion helps us understand the words and message of the song better. My husband also taped me doing the hand motions to the song at our home, put it on Youtube (it’s not there anymore; sorry friends), and asked the parents to play it for their kids throughout the weeks to promote practice at home and hopefully discussion about the song lyrics within the families. As the performance day approached, some of the children expressed fear and other negative attitudes. This was a great opportunity to share with them multiple times that we are not performing to receive praise, glory, and attention from the audience. We want to help the audience focus on the lyrics of the song, praising Christ for coming to be our Lord and Savior!
Performing
For me, the actual performance is the least important aspect of it all. Of course I would love it if they projected their voices, got all the hand motions right, smiled with big eyes even though the bright lights were shining down on them, and caused everyone in the audience to clap along and chuckle at how cute they are… but I told them that even if they mess up really bad, it is completely okay because the most important thing is that they are thinking about the words they are singing and considering who Christ is and what He did for them. The dress rehearsal the night before the concert was (and has always been) a “controlled chaos” as the kids get to practice on stage for the first time with the homemade fleece scarves and jingle bell bracelets. But this helps the kids familiarize themselves with the stage and to not have stage fright! Then came the actual performance. With the help of the staff, we got the kids in costume, prayed for our performance, and quietly (well, as quietly as you can with over 20 jingle bells on wrists) walked on stage to perform. As usual, I squatted in front of them to help them with the hand motions in case they all forgot (who knows, it could happen). They did a great job! I couldn’t help but smile a lot as I watched them sing about Christ while praying in my heart that one day they would all come to submit their lives to Christ and truly worship Him. As soon as they finished, we went straight to our Sonlight room and had a birthday party for Jesus! One of the teachers explained why Jesus’ birthday is most important because though He is God, He chose to come down to earth as a man and die for our sins, but since He rose from the dead He still lives today!
In my opinion, the biggest challenge of this whole process is the fact that most of the children are not Christians. We do not want them to think they are just because they are singing and doing hand motions to a song about Christ. In reality, we hope that the opposite would happen- that as they listen to the song lyrics, they might consider God’s character, what sin is, how they each are slaves to sin, and why they would need hope – specifically, Christ. We also can’t force them to be joyful as they practice and perform because it must come from a heart that has been saved and loves Christ.
I’ll end with a memory following one of our Sunday practices that made me smile: After finishing practice, we let the kids just hang out and play some games while waiting for the parents. One of the kindergartners was just walking around the room, doing the hand motions and mouthing the lyrics as she observed some boys playing a ball game. This same girl later told me that she had been practicing the song in her shower. I prayed at that moment that she would one day be a true worshiper of Christ.