Where did THAT come from?

God works in mysterious ways. He didn’t strike me with lightning for my recent posting (which was somewhat critical of Him) but he did apparently have a conversation with my kids because when they got home from their grandparents’ yesterday they immediately asked me to show them a picture of Jesus on the cross.

This is a topic that has never been mentioned by me to them, unless they’ve been reading my blog. . . so I was caught a little off guard.

However, I’m a mom and religion is part of the territory so I took a deep breath and plunged in. ‘Why do you want to see that picture? It’s not a very happy picture. Wouldn’t you rather see a picture of Jesus as a baby in the manger instead?’

As an extra incentive I added, ‘With all the cows and donkeys?’ But nothing doing, they wanted Jesus on the cross.

So out came the Young Reader’s Bible I’ve been hiding and blogging about and we looked at the picture together, thankfully toned down for young readers.

K wanted to know: ‘Mama, who’s God?’

I took a page out of Meg's book. ‘Well, darling, some people believe he’s the king of angels and Jesus’ papa.’ This answer was accepted.

Then she wanted to know: ‘Mama, do you know why they hung Jesus on the cross?’

Ah. First why question. Much tougher than who questions. ‘Er. . . because they were mean people?’ I hazarded lamely.

‘No, Mama. It’s because he wasn’t the right Jesus. He was a fake Jesus.’

I could feel my lips moving as I stared at her, silently mouthing, ‘Fake Jesus.’

Where did that come from? I’d like to say I made some great answer to this that K will someday tell her own kids but what actually came out of my mouth was, ‘That’s interesting, darling, are you hungry?’

K wasn’t hungry. She wanted to talk about fake Jesus. I was just gearing up to say that even if he was fake, it was pretty mean to hang him on a cross when I was saved by the phone.

‘Thank God!’ I muttered, then remembered my recent posting and looked upwards a bit guiltily.

K wanted to answer the phone so I let her, figuring whoever it was could chat with my 5-year-old for a few minutes. And get her off topic.

Then I got my next surprise: The call was for her! It was her 6-year-old friend from next door calling to ask if she could come over and play. They had a short conversation to work out the logistics and signed off with a casual, ‘Tschuss, bis bald!’

So…. when did K get so big that we’re discussing religion and she gets more calls than I do???

P.S. The church sign is fake. If you want to design your own fake church sign you can do this here. Thanks R Max for the tip!