easter cookies and heaven

Today, the kids and I baked Easter cookies. Not wanting the true meaning of Easter to be lost in the hullabaloo of bunnies, eggs, and sprinkles-which, on a side note, is what happened this Christmas. Once the holiday was over I realized that I let the whole season go by without having the main focus be on Jesus. I guess that's one of the by-products of living back at my parents house. Growing up, all of our holidays were very commercialized. We weren't a Christian household and we didn't talk about the birth of Jesus, or His death and resurrection either. Even now, I have to make a conscious effort to un-paganize my holidays because of the traditions I was raised with, and still cherish.

So today, during the shaking of sprinkles on to the doughy bunnies and eggs, I took the opportunity to talk to the kids about Jesus dying on the cross, being buried in a tomb, and rising on the third day. Abby seemed to know all about it already-I guess all that churchin' and Sunday schoolin' is working out. Gage was a little surprised and excited because he thought Easter meant we were going to “see” Jesus.

So, after I re-explained Easter to him, we segued into the second-coming discussion. I told him that Jesus is in fact coming back, but that we don’t know when (but probably not this Easter). Next we were discussing heaven... I entertained their every thought. Marissa thinks God will like her ballet. Gage wants to takes naps on clouds and ride a gold motorcycle on the gold street. And Abby says she will be happy when she gets to heaven because "God will be in charge of her instead of Mom"...but ultimately I had to let the kids know that we really don’t know exactly what heaven will be like, but that it will be great.

Later that evening I overheard Gage (age 5) talking to my dad. “Poppi, when you die, I want you to make sure you take your cell phone to heaven with you- that way I can call you up and find out what it’s like.”