Who Is In Charge Here?
© 1999 Don Rogers
The program for the children to present at Christmas time was, I thought, one of my better if somewhat elaborate endeavors.
I wanted to honor the various Christmas traditions around the world while still focusing on the centrality of Christ. The world tour opened up lots of doors for costumes and music.
The Christ question ("take me to your leader," "are you their leader?") was to be spoken over and over again by a robotic adult voice as an alien who would step out of a space ship with a blast from a CO2 extinguisher.
And so it went, smoothly, from country to country with costumed children and international music but the question always being raised and left unanswered, "Are you their leader?"
Then program would move toward a climax with the children in costumes picking up an evergreen branch and a candle to stand on some risers and form a living Christmas tree just before the Three Magi would enter.
That's when the leadership issue became personal. Somehow I had not placed the branches and the candles in the place where the children knew they were to be. So when the young boy with the German accent spoke his lines, "And so you see from all over the world a living Christmas tree is formed before your very eyes," all that happened was chaos and confusion. He repeated his lines and the chaos continued. So, as if I didn't know, he broke out of his character accent and spoke to me directly, "Well, I don't think so, Bev."
We scrambled and did get the branches and the candles to the children and the tree was formed. The robotic voiced alien did speak to the entering Magi who led him to the manger. He did find our leader and rushed off to spread the word throughout the universe. But many to this day can quote the phrase, "Well, I don't think so Bev."