Angel’s Announcement to Mary and Elizabeth: Christmas Sunday School Lesson

Luke 1:26-38

Materials Needed:

• The TOP SECRET envelope from last week. Inside it, put a piece of paper with “Luke 1:26-38” written or printed on it in invisible ink. (Here’s how to make invisible ink.)
• A desk lamp with a 100-watt light bulb

What happened when you were born? Maybe your parents put up some decorations in the house. Maybe they sent out text messages to the whole family to tell them your time of birth, height, and weight.

Or maybe they made a social media post that went something like, “We’ve welcomed a new addition into the fam! Meet baby Bartholomeus Justus McMerditroy…the third. He measured 3 feet and weighed 50 pounds. We’re so proud of our big (very big) boy!”

Okay, maybe I’m exaggerating things. But being born is a very special event. That’s why we keep celebrating our birthdays every single year. Except grown ups. They stop having birthdays after they hit 40 or so. At least that’s what they want us to think…

Anyway, does anyone want to share their experiences that day? What did you feel? Were you excited to be born?

What, no takers? Ok, obviously you can’t tell people what you felt on your “zero” birthday. It’s impossible to remember it.

But there is one person who knows exactly what happened on their birthday. Who?

Jesus. Maybe the human baby part of him didn’t know what was going on. But Jesus is one with God the Father. God the Father certainly knew what was happening!

Remember how we talked about Doctor Luke last week, and how he wrote down his investigations about Jesus? Luke did this because Jesus isn’t ordinary. He’s extraordinary. And his birth was extraordinary, too.

So let’s dive into an investigation of Jesus’ birth today. Let’s see what Luke has to say about it.

Here we go. Here’s our TOP SECRET envelope. Do you dare open it? Who knows, there could be worms wiggling around in there or something. Any brave takers?

(Let a student open it)

Umm. I guess the agents messed up today? I don’t see anything on this paper. Guess we’re going to have to look for clues elsewhere.

Is there anything out of the ordinary in our classroom today? (Bump into the desk lamp if the students don’t notice it).

Hmm, this is strange. (Call a random student’s name), did you put this here? No?

Maybe it’s our clue. Let’s try shining it on this paper. Hold the paper close to the lamp or let a student do so (as explained in the video link above).

Ah-ha! There it is. Luke 1:26-38. That’s our clue. It must be where Luke wrote down Jesus’ birth height and weight.

(Read Luke 1:26-30 out loud. Or have students read it).

Wait, that’s a strange birth announcement. Isn’t it the mom and dad’s job to announce the birth after a baby is born?

Here, an angel is giving the mom a birth announcement. Whoa, an angel? Maybe I had little angel decorations at the baby shower my mom had for me. But no angels announced my birth.

And there’s something else odd here–this lady, Mary, is engaged. But she’s not married yet. She doesn’t live with her fiance, Joseph. So how is she going to have a baby? Babies have to have dads in order to be born.

So who’s this baby’s dad? Luke the doctor, as he’s writing this, knows babies can’t just poof into existence out of nothing. So he made sure to include an explanation for this.

The angel told Mary: “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will cover you. For this reason the baby will be holy and will be called the Son of God.” (vs. 35)

The Holy Spirit, who is also God, was going to make this possible. God was going to be the father of this baby. Incredible, right?

This is a true miracle. No other babies have ever been born this way. Only Jesus.

So Jesus isn’t the son of Joseph. He is the Son of God. This made him both human and God at the same time. And that means he CAN’T be “a cute baby in a nice Christmas story”, or “just a good teacher”, or “a nice man who helped people”.

If he’s just a good teacher, then Doctor Luke is a liar. And so is Mary, and all the other people who saw Mary have a baby without a human daddy.

But if Luke’s a liar, it wouldn’t make sense for people to copy down his words over and over for thousands of years, so that you could have his investigation in your hands today. Because that’s what they did…people had to copy things by hand!

Maybe you get annoyed when you have to do a homework paper by hand. Maybe you already know how to type on the computer, and you’d rather just type and print. Well, imagine copying the entire book of Luke by hand…a few times over…and by candlelight.

That’s what people did so that you could sit here today and read about Jesus’ birth. And to those people, it was worth it, because Jesus was no ordinary baby.

Speaking of that birth announcement, let’s get back to it. What else did the angel Gabriel say about the baby? His hair color? Eye color?

(Read verses 30-33, or have a student read them).

Wait a second…did Gabriel just mention what his name should be? Now that’s different.

Imagine a stranger comes to your mom’s house when you’re in her belly. The stranger says, “Hun, just wanna let you know…your baby has to be called Bubba Burt McBungee.” Umm…your mom would probably freak out.

Yes, that would be totally weird. For an ordinary baby like you or me, anyway.

But for the Son of God? It’s not weird, because if you think about it, Jesus has always existed. So he always knew what his name was, even before he was born. Crazy, right?

The angel said Jesus would be GREAT. He will rule, and his kingdom will never end. An endless kingdom? That’s not possible for us regular old humans.

Alright, I’d say our investigation is complete for today. We’ve read Jesus’ birth announcement, as it was recorded by Luke. But there’s still some time to go before he’ll be born. And there are still more mysteries for us to uncover! What are they? You’ll have to show up to next week’s  (see the entire lesson series here) investigation to find out!

(Close in prayer)