Here’s a readers’ theatre for Christmas Eve, written by Carol Penner and posted on her Leading in Worship blog. To view the whole piece, click on the link below.
Carol writes: “I wrote this for a Christmas Eve service and I had different congregants take the parts; they got up from where they were sitting in the congregation and came to the front to say their part, then they each lit a candle and placed it at around the manger scene that was at the front of the church. Congregation members could each be invited to light a candle after their part to honour Jesus.”
Christmas Reader's Theatre:
For Unto Us a Child is Born!
Narrator: Waiting, watching, hoping against hope,
the faithful have looked and longed for a Saviour.
Wrapped up in our own lives, in our own struggles,
consumed with our own desires and our own sins,
still our hope was in God.
At long last, all generations cry out,
“For unto us a child is born”.
the faithful have looked and longed for a Saviour.
Wrapped up in our own lives, in our own struggles,
consumed with our own desires and our own sins,
still our hope was in God.
At long last, all generations cry out,
“For unto us a child is born”.
Abraham: My name is Abraham. I followed God’s call.
I went from my own country and my kindred
I went from my own country and my kindred
to the land that God showed me.
God promised to make a nation from my descendants.
God said that all families of the earth would be blessed through me.
Now we see the fulfillment of that promise with the gift of this child…
today we are blessed indeed!
For unto us a child is born.
God promised to make a nation from my descendants.
God said that all families of the earth would be blessed through me.
Now we see the fulfillment of that promise with the gift of this child…
today we are blessed indeed!
For unto us a child is born.
Hagar: I am Hagar. I was Sarah’s slavegirl.
I bore Abraham a son, whom I called Ishmael.
When I was at the end of all hope because of my suffering,
I fled into the wilderness.
It was there that I met “the God who hears”;
the God who hears even the crying of the cast out.
God has heard the cries of all people; the insiders and the outsiders.
This baby is a gift to us: a gift for all peoples.
For unto us a child is born!
I bore Abraham a son, whom I called Ishmael.
When I was at the end of all hope because of my suffering,
I fled into the wilderness.
It was there that I met “the God who hears”;
the God who hears even the crying of the cast out.
God has heard the cries of all people; the insiders and the outsiders.
This baby is a gift to us: a gift for all peoples.
For unto us a child is born!
To view the rest of the litany, click here.
— written by Carol Penner, and posted on her blog, Leading in Worship. Visit that site for many other excellent resources for worship.
For more worship resources for Advent and Christmas, see the indexes at the top right side of this blog, or click on Advent or Christmas in the list of “Labels” at the lower right side of the page.
For more readers’ theatre, click on Readers’ Theatre in the list of “Labels” at the lower right.
