AN EMPTY, PLASTIC EASTER EGG

I tell it from memory, and, thus, I may not always get it exactly as it was told to happen. I share it often at Easter. Each time I am moved. It took what others would call a mentally handicapped preteen boy to really capture what Easter is all about. Let me just go ahead and tell it as I remember: The Preteen Sunday School class teacher had thought of a great activity that would be an object lesson to go with her Easter teaching. Taking her students outside, to each she gave one of those colored, plastic Easter eggs that come apart in the middle. She instruct the children to scour the church grounds for anything that would remind them of Jesus' Resurrection and to put it in their egg. Later they would return to class to see what each had discovered. Back in class, the teacher had each come to the front of the room and open his/her egg and reveal its contents. Sue opened hers. There was a flower bud. Flowers come with the Spring and so does Easter. Bill had green grass in his egg. The grass had been dead and gray, but it had come back alive in the Spring, just like Jesus had. One after the other came. The contents and explanations were all about the same as Sue and Bill's. Then Philip's turn came. He stood in front of the class and opened his egg. Nothing. There was nothing in it. The students began to chuckle and chide. "Oh, Philip, you always get stuff wrong." Some were more cruel: "Philip, you can't ever do anything right." The teacher shushed her students and gave Philip a chance to explain. "Philip, why is your egg empty. Could you not find anything? That's ok if you couldn't." "No!" Philip spoke with a quiver close to a cry in his voice. "My egg is empty because Jesus' tomb was empty." The class became quiet. Then, someone began to clap. They all clap. Philip had captured the meaning of Easter. Sadly, just weeks later, Philip died. At his funeral at the end when viewers pass by, in line were Philip's Sunday School fellow students. Each held a brightly colored, plastic Easter egg. As each passed Philip's casket, he would place his empty egg with Philip in the casket. One day Philip's casket will be as empty as the egg, as Jesus' tomb.