The tree and other decorations were up in the living room, the colorful lights were flashing in the entryway, and the Christmas sugar cookies that Amilah and I had decorated with our sisters were on the table…we were ready for the English club to arrive. And sure enough, they did.
After spending some time hanging out, eating cookies and playing Mafia and Crazy 8s, we split our 20ish friends from the English club into four teams to compete in a Christmas competition of holiday word searches, festive fill-in-the-blanks and pin the hat on the snowman. After my team dominated the competition, we gathered everyone together, assigned parts to our Asian friends, and watched as they acted out the Nativity…I was double casted as both Mary’s donkey and the sheep.
After we had acted out why we celebrate Christmas, we went back into our teams for “conversation time” to talk about why Christmas is important. Columbo and I were able to share with the 4 Asian students on our team what happened after that baby in the manger had grown up. At the end of the story we asked if they wanted to be God’s friend and they all said yes – 3 new sisters and 1 new brother! In the other room, Hershey, with the help of our national brothers Mike and Ian, was able to share in his group as well. Mike helped translate and was able to help Double join the family right then and there. In Amilah’s group, Lewis was excited to learn more about God. Amilah connected Lewis to Hershey, and Hershey was able to lead Lewis in a prayer to join the family too! Three new sisters, three new brothers and one hundred and thirty seven sugar cookies later, the Christmas party was a success!