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Success after IF
Church-going mamas. . .
I'd like your thoughts, please.
First, a huge rave for The J.esus S.torybook B.ible - if you don't already have it, check it out.
We got it as a gift for DS for his baptism, expecting him to "use" it during his late toddler/ elementary school years. (Because, while directed toward children, the stories are still too young for a 2 year old.)
Well, he found it on his bookshelf a few weeks ago, and has not let it out of his sight since. He is CAPTIVATED by the illustrations (which I don't think are that special, but apparently he does), and insists on having his "Jesus book" near him at all times. Sweet, right? 
Here's the thing - he turned to the (very child friendly) illustration of Jesus on the cross - "What's that?" I told him that it's a picture of Jesus hurt. Then there are illustrations of the cave, and the resurrection. . .
Now his most favorite page is "Jesus hurt." Which is slightly odd/ concerning in and of itself! But my question is, what would you tell him about this series of illustrations? I didn't expect to face this so soon, honestly. I thought we'd stick with "Jesus loves the little children" and whatnot for a few years
Right now I'm going with Jesus was hurt, they put him in the cave because he was hurt, then he wasn't hurt anymore.
I don't want to say something just totally wrong that I'll have to go back on down the road (i.e. Jesus went to sleep), but I'm also not ready to get into death and etc. with a newly turned 2 year old, especially in such an abstract context. Thoughts?
ETA: Not to suggest, by my title, that you have to go to church to read the B.ible or any such thing. Just didn't want to say "religious" and this title seemed easy. Sorry if it rubs anyone the wrong way.
This discussion has been closed.
Re: Church-going mamas. . .
PCOS, Ectopic & M/C of twins October 2010, Currently TTC #2
We talk about how Jesus was very nice, and he was nice to everyone, the strange people, the hurt people, the people who look odd, and tried to help everyone he met. There were some really mean people who hurt Jesus, and that's why he was on the cross, but Jesus was so special he went to Heaven and he watches over us and takes care of us.
She gets the tomb idea, we did some 'empty tomb' crafts and the like. She seems to get it.
We emphasize the importance of being nice and not judging people, and how Jesus watches over us from Heaven.
For Easter, we focused a lot on the foot washing and Communion. Mostly because that's my gig at church - setting up foot washing and Communion and she's a part of that, so she loved the idea of washing feet as a sign of love and the Last Supper.
We have sort of just skipped the whole 'dead' part of it.
I just told her that some men didn't like Jesus, so they put him on a cross, then they put him in a tomb, and three days later he got out of the tomb and went up to heaven to be with God.
I wasn't really sure how to handle it, but she was perfectly fine with it. As a matter of fact, she still hasn't really connected that Easter is about Jesus. I've explained it over and over again, but even still, when you ask her what Easter is all about, she says "Eggs!".
I'll try again next year, I guess ;-)
I think you are going the right direction with this. Teaching Christianity isn't easy because there is literally blood and guts death involved. And for some little boys that is incredibly interesting!
This Easter was particularly hard for me because DS has really grasped the concept of death and heaven so there was a lot of "But, I don't want to die!" I have always talked about how my dad is in heaven with God. So is an uncle that DS knew, so he is getting it and was pretty sad about it. I don't know what I can do about it really, at some point he'll learn that he will die. (Man do I hate even having to type that out!)
It is as challenging and un-fun as having to teach your toddler fear (fear of the stove, fear of the street, fear of strangers.)
Basically though what I say is that Jesus died and went to heaven to be with God so that we can go to heaven too. I recently discovered that using the term "live with God" was confusing, so I have switched to "be with God." I'm also beginning to think that I need to switch to his soul/spirit is going to heaven to be with God, because that will help keep things consistent when we go to funerals/cemeteries/places with caskets. Makes my head spin!
This is basically how we approached it when the boys were young, and what we'll do again this time around when Tessa is old enough to start learning the concepts. Once the boys got to be about five, we started introducing the death and the resurrection.