The Birth of Jesus: A Free Christmas Play for Children

by Felicia Mollohan on Wednesday 28 October 2009| Print

in Children's Ministry Ideas,Christmas Ideas

Here is a simple kids Christmas skit for church. You can download, print, and use with your children’s choir. Like all our resources this is 100% free for you to use in your children’s ministry. This pageant is written directly from the Bible, only adding songs and direction for the actors. There are no speaking parts for the actors, only a narrator. The narration is indicated by being in italics. Please leave a comment below with any suggestions or to let us know how you used our Christmas play in your church. You can also check out our other free Christmas plays.

Print this free Christmas script

Ages: This pageant has been used with a preschool ages 1-5 year olds as well as a children’s church ages 2 – 5th grade.

Costumes: These can be as simple or as extravagant as you want them to be. We have used large t-shirts for all of the children (in different colors) when we were on a very little budget. The first year, we didn’t even have a budget, so we asked all of the parents to donate a large t-shirt (they were more than happy to do that). We have also bought cheap white flat sheets, had the children watercolor on them and then cut them up for all of the head dresses. Yarn can be braided to make belts, cardboard can be cut and painted for wings, tree glitter garland can be used to make halos and Burger King still has crowns! Be creative and have the children help make their costumes!

Props: Just like the costumes, can be as simple or as extravagant as you want them to be. We have used large cardboard boxes and sheets to cover up the equipments on the stage with a simple “Bethlehem” sign. Don’t forget Baby Jesus!!!

Songs: We used a CD with children’s voices. We gave the Sunday School teachers a CD with the just the songs that the children will be singing so that they could practice. We played the CD with the children’s voices with our children singing. We have done this with 60 1-5 year olds and 30 2 year old-5th graders and we could ALWAYS hear our children over the CD. It just helped our children feel more confident in their singing if we played the CD with the voices. Don’t worry about not being able to hear your children.

Narration: We opted to have a person in the balcony with a microphone, over pre-taping the narration. This way, she could watch the children and make sure that they were in their places before she went on. This also gave something for the children to look at when they got nervous.

Direction: Someone stood beside the Narrator to help remind the children where they were to go. We also had helpers on both sides of the church to help the children down the aisles.

Practices: Since we gave the CD to the Sunday School teachers for the children to practice the singing during class on Sundays, we didn’t need to practice much. We gave the narrator their parts about a month early so that they were comfortable with them and we had the children (who had individual moving parts) practice during class. This helped us only need 1 dress rehearsal on a Saturday morning for 2 hours. We were able to run through the pageant 2 times and then have Happy Birthday, Jesus party to celebrate afterwards!

Just remember, the parents are looking at their child and how great they are up on stage! Our goal is to share the Good News of Jesus’ Birth with others!

CHARACTERS LIST:

Narrator
Mary
Joseph
Main Angel
Angels (usually all of the little girls)
Shepherds (usually all of the little boys)
Sheep (optional – depending on if you have enough children)
Wisemen (they need gifts)
King Herod
Stars (usually the littlest of your children)
Star Holder (this person holds up a star and leads the wisemen in)
Registrar (optional – this part was added because there was a child
who needed a part)
Innkeeper (optional – this part was added because there was a child who needed a part)

Christmas Play Script

** As the parents are entering, play a Christmas CD for background music.

CHILDREN’S MINISTER WELCOMES THE PARENTS AND STARTS WITH AN OPENING PRAYER

“Oh Little Town of Bethlehem” will be playing in the background.

Registrar will walk to stage right
Innkeeper will walk to stage left

In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. And everyone went to his own town to register.

Joseph and Mary walk on stage to the Registrar

So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child.

Joseph and Mary walk across the stage to the Innkeeper

While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.

Innkeeper shakes head “no”

Joseph and Mary walk to center stage, sit in chairs and pull out baby Jesus from underneath one of the chairs.

“It Came Upon A Midnight Clear” will be playing in the background.
?Main Angel will come in and stand stage left
Shepherds (and sheep) come in and stand (kneel) in front of angel

And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord.”

All children on stage will sing “Away in a Manger”

“Hark the Herald Angels Sing” will be playing in the background.

Angels will come in and stand with the Main Angel

Suddenly a great company of heavenly hosts appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests.”

Shepherds go see Jesus

So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger. When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them.

All on stage will sing “Joy to the World”

Angels, Registrar and Innkeeper will sit down
King will go where the Angels were

“We Three Kings” will be playing in the background

Wisemen and Star Holder will go to see the King

After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, Wise Men from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, “Where is the one who has been born the king of the Jews? We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him.” Then King Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and make a careful search for the child.”

Stars come in and stand in front

All on stage will sing “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star”

Stars will sit down on stage
Star holder will walk over and hold the star over Mary and Joseph
Wisemen will walk slowly over to Mary and Joseph

After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen in the east went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was.

Wisemen bow down to baby Jesus and give their gifts

On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshipped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh.

All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: “The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” which means,…

“God with us.” (all children will say with narrator)

The Birth of Jesus: A Free Christmas Play for Children

Christmas Play Script

Similar Posts You May Enjoy

Curriculum

Activities

Helpful Posts

Forums

Reader Comments

Beacon Network