Resurrection Eggs

I've been looking for a few ways to share the "real" Easter with the kids this week and while listening to the radio this morning I was reminded of Resurrection Eggs (a.k.a. Holy Week Eggs, Christian Easter Eggs).  If you read my blog often you know that our family loves our eggs (and the hens that lay them), so it seemed perfect for us.  

I did a quick search and found a great site that directed me to everything I needed.  I've made a few of my own edits that work for our family and here they are for you in the event that you wish to share them with your family.

I'm planning to get ours ready in the next few days and if I remember to take a picture I will add it to the post for all to see.

Resurrection Eggs

Materials Needed:

•   1 dozen plastic Easter eggs

•   1 empty egg carton

•   Card Stock to make a new label for the carton and to print the verses

•   Colorful permanent markers to make the eggs and decorate the carton

•   The following 12 items to place inside each egg

Number the eggs 1 to 12 and fill accordingly.  Prepare ahead of time.  Open an egg a day for the 12 days preceding Easter or do all 12 Easter morning

1.      Palm Branch

2.      Soap

3.      Picture of Bread & Cup

4.      Silver

5.      Feather

6.      Stem with Thorns (rose bush)

7.      Small Cross

8.      Nail

9.      Dice

10.   Spices in baggie, cloth strip

11.   Stone

12.   EMPTY

Here are the verses to print out with each egg if you have children that are already reading.  Use the Bible translation that you think your children will best understand for each verse.  I used a combination of The Message and New International Version, but you may prefer another.  Don’t be surprised to find that your children go back and examine the contents of the eggs and the verses again later on their own.  I find their little minds inquire quite extensively when they don’t think anyone is looking …

1.      Palm Branch:

John 12:12-13 (NIV)

 The next day the great crowd that had come for the festival heard that Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem. They took palm branches and went out to meet him, shouting,

  “Hosanna!”

  “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!”

  “Blessed is the king of Israel!”

2.      Soap: 

John 13:3-5 (MSG)

Jesus knew that the Father had put him in complete charge of everything, that he came from God and was on his way back to God. So he got up from the supper table, set aside his robe, and put on an apron. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the feet of the disciples, drying them with his apron. When he got to Simon Peter, Peter said, "Master, you wash my feet?"

3.      Picture of Bread and Cup:

Mark 14:22-25 (MSG)

In the course of their meal, having taken and blessed the bread, he broke it and gave it to them. Then he said,

Take, this is my body.

Taking the chalice, he gave it to them, thanking God, and they all drank from it. He said, This is my blood, God's new covenant, Poured out for many people.

"I'll not be drinking wine again until the new day when I drink it in the kingdom of God."

4.      Silver:

Matthew 26:14-16 (MSG)

That is when one of the Twelve, the one named Judas Iscariot, went to the cabal of high priests and said, "What will you give me if I hand him over to you?" They settled on thirty silver pieces. He began looking for just the right moment to hand him over.

5.      Feather: 

Mark 14:29-31, 53-72 (MSG)

Peter blurted out, "Even if everyone else is ashamed of you when things fall to pieces, I won't be."

Jesus said, "Don't be so sure. Today, this very night in fact, before the rooster crows twice, you will deny me three times."

He blustered in protest, "Even if I have to die with you, I will never deny you." All the others said the same thing.

They led Jesus to the Chief Priest, where the high priests, religious leaders, and scholars had gathered together. Peter followed at a safe distance until they got to the Chief Priest's courtyard, where he mingled with the servants and warmed himself at the fire.

The high priests conspiring with the Jewish Council looked high and low for evidence against Jesus by which they could sentence him to death. They found nothing. Plenty of people were willing to bring in false charges, but nothing added up, and they ended up canceling each other out. Then a few of them stood up and lied: "We heard him say, 'I am going to tear down this Temple, built by hard labor, and in three days build another without lifting a hand.'" But even they couldn't agree exactly.

In the middle of this, the Chief Priest stood up and asked Jesus, "What do you have to say to the accusation?" Jesus was silent. He said nothing.

The Chief Priest tried again, this time asking, "Are you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed?"

Jesus said, "Yes, I am, and you'll see it yourself: 
The Son of Man seated at the right hand of the Mighty One, arriving on the clouds of heaven."

The Chief Priest lost his temper. Ripping his clothes, he yelled, "Did you hear that? After that do we need witnesses? You heard the blasphemy. Are you going to stand for it?"

They condemned him, one and all. The sentence: death.

Some of them started spitting at him. They blindfolded his eyes, then hit him, saying, "Who hit you? Prophesy!" The guards, punching and slapping, took him away.

While all this was going on, Peter was down in the courtyard. One of the Chief Priest's servant girls came in and, seeing Peter warming himself there, looked hard at him and said, "You were with the Nazarene, Jesus."

He denied it: "I don't know what you're talking about." He went out on the porch. A rooster crowed.

The girl spotted him and began telling the people standing around, "He's one of them." He denied it again.

After a little while, the bystanders brought it up again. "You've got to be one of them. You've got 'Galilean' written all over you."

Now Peter got really nervous and swore, "I never laid eyes on this man you're talking about." Just then the rooster crowed a second time. Peter remembered how Jesus had said, "Before a rooster crows twice, you'll deny me three times." He collapsed in tears.

6.      Stem with Thorns:

John 19:2-3 (MSG)

So Pilate took Jesus and had him whipped. The soldiers, having braided a crown from thorns, set it on his head, threw a purple robe over him, and approached him with, "Hail, King of the Jews!" Then they greeted him with slaps in the face.

7.      Small Cross: 

John 19:17-18 (NIV)

Carrying his own cross, he went out to the place of the Skull (which in Aramaic is called Golgotha). There they crucified him, and with him two others—one on each side and Jesus in the middle.

8.      Nail:

 Luke 23:33 (MSG)

When they got to the place called Skull Hill, they crucified him, along with the criminals, one on his right, the other on his left.

9.      Dice:

John 19:23-24 (MSG)

When they crucified him, the Roman soldiers took his clothes and divided them up four ways, to each soldier a fourth. But his robe was seamless, a single piece of weaving, so they said to each other, "Let's not tear it up. Let's throw dice to see who gets it." This confirmed the Scripture that said, "They divided up my clothes among them and threw dice for my coat." (The soldiers validated the Scriptures!)

While the soldiers were looking after themselves, Jesus' mother, his aunt, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene stood at the foot of the cross. Jesus saw his mother and the disciple he loved standing near her. He said to his mother, "Woman, here is your son." Then to the disciple, "Here is your mother." From that moment the disciple accepted her as his own mother.

10.   Spices, Cloth:

John 19:38-40 (NIV)

Later, Joseph of Arimathea asked Pilate for the body of Jesus. Now Joseph was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly because he feared the Jewish leaders. With Pilate’s permission, he came and took the body away. He was accompanied by Nicodemus, the man who earlier had visited Jesus at night. Nicodemus brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds. Taking Jesus’ body, the two of them wrapped it, with the spices, in strips of linen. This was in accordance with Jewish burial customs.

11.   Stone:

Matthew 27:59-60 (NIV)

Joseph took the body, wrapped it in a clean linen cloth, and placed it in his own new tomb that he had cut out of the rock. He rolled a big stone in front of the entrance to the tomb and went away.

12.   EMPTY:

Matthew 28:1-6 (NIV)

After the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to look at the tomb.

There was a violent earthquake, for an angel of the Lord came down from heaven and, going to the tomb, rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothes were white as snow. The guards were so afraid of him that they shook and became like dead men.

The angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified.  He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay.