The Shepherd's Story

To celebrate the Christmas message in a humorous way.

by Guy Donegan-Cross

Suitable for Whole School (Pri)

Aims

To celebrate the Christmas message in a humorous way.

Preparation and materials

• Shepherd's outfit (dressing gown and tea towel!), animal figurine, simple wooden cross, doll in baby clothes.
• This is simply a monologue which you can perform with as much gusto as you can muster. You don't need to stick to the script - the props can act as your guide.

Assembly

(Enter dressed as a shepherd, with your bag over your shoulder.)

You'll never guess where I've just come from. A bloke like me; who'd have thought it? A simple, smelly shepherd! I mean, I have just seen the most amazing thing you could ever hope to see. And what's more, I've got some things in here to prove it (point to bag).

It all began the other night. Some of us were all sitting round minding our sheep and washing our socks, when suddenly there was this enormous light in the sky and the sound of singing like you've never heard before. We all looked up with our mouths open like this (open mouth).

Suddenly, one of the angels who was there said, 'Oi, you!' At least I think it was something like that but I can't quite remember, we were just sitting down with our mouths open. 'Get down to Bethlehem,' he said. 'The king of the world is about to be born and he wants you to go and see him.'

'All right,' I said. 'But who's going to look after the sheep?'

'Don't worry about that,' said the angel. 'You just get down to Bethlehem and we'll mind your sheep - we're quite good at that.'

So we ran down to Bethlehem, and we found him. It was the most amazing night of my life. The king of the world - a baby! When he saw me, the baby looked at me and laughed - at least I think it was laughing, I'm not very good with baby sounds. His mother Mary was there and she was such a sweetie. In fact, after I had been there a while I asked if I could take a few things just to remind myself of what I had seen. You know, souvenirs and things like that. And she said, 'No problem.'

Would you like to see them? Okay. Well, the first thing I've got is this little cow (take out animal). Okay, I know it's a bit small but I couldn't bring you the real thing, could I? Do you know what this reminds me of? Well, the place they were in was a stable, and it was smelly. I mean soooo smelly. You might expect a king to be born in a palace, but this one was born in straw and in the most cramped little place. But it was still wonderful, and in a funny kind of way it seemed right.

I'll show you the next thing, then. I asked Mary if I could take a bit of wood from the stable, just to remind me of the place. She said, 'Fine.' But when I picked this up, she got the strangest look on her face (bring out the cross). I mean, I don't know what all the fuss was about - it's only two bits of wood.

But the best thing I took I've saved till last. You see, we all felt that this was so special, that the baby was a gift. So I thought I had better do something about that (take the doll out of the bag). So I've got him here. I figured if he was a gift then I had better take him with me.

Why are you laughing? I haven't done anything wrong have I? But … Oh, you mean, he's a gift for everyone?

Silly me!

Oh well, I suppose I'd better go and take him back. They'll be wondering where he is. Goodbye, then.

(Walk off, cuddling and talking to doll.)

Time for reflection

Shepherds watched their flocks.
Angels - shepherds shocked!
New-born boy - shepherds joy.
New-born king - angels sing.
Christmas story - glory, glory.

Song/music

'Rise up, shepherd' (Come and Praise, 116)