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Before we arrived at Metro Camp, our illustrious camp speaker, Sabrina, hid hundreds of “Tiny Jesus” figurines all over camp. The first night at worship, Sabrina challenged the children to keep their eyes open for Tiny Jesus. When they found one, they were to pick it up, have a leader take a picture, and then send the picture to her so that their picture could go in the slide show each evening. Well, this sparked quite a “manhunt” for Tiny Jesus!

Everywhere we went, children kept their eyes peeled for Tiny Jesus. These figurines were less than an inch tall and each had a different colored sash. They were found beside trees and rocks, in the worship center, and in the dining room. Tiny Jesus was seen on hikes, at the zip-line, and even in the med cabin. I heard some interesting comments along the way.

 “Mrs. Christy! I found a tiny Jesus! Take my picture!”

 “Oh look! It’s a Tiny Jesus…wait…it’s just bird poop.”

Once when a tiny Jesus lost his head, I heard, “Mrs. Christy, can you heal the Healer?”

Then I started hearing, “Will you trade me a purple Jesus for a pink Jesus?”

Everyone wanted at least one Tiny Jesus; and for some reason pink Tiny Jesus was the favorite of all. Bargaining abounded. Then things got a little out of hand.

On Saturday morning, I learned that one unfortunate camper had been trapped in a bathroom stall because he wasn’t willing to trade his Tiny Jesus. After that I found out that money was trading hands for Tiny Jesus.

“I’ll give you $1.00 for your Tiny Jesus.”

“Wait! I’ll give you $3.00 for it!”

I think the highest price Tiny Jesus went for was $5.00 that morning; but it all came to an end when Mrs. Christy found out. I had to have a conversation with the campers about NOT selling Tiny Jesus. (Remember Jesus in the temple with his whip, flipping tables? I felt like it might be time to flip some tables if we couldn’t get this under control.) But seriously…

Tiny Jesus led to some great lessons.

 First of all, we SHOULD be looking for Jesus all the time and everywhere we go. Jesus is at work all around us, we just have to be looking to see what He is doing!

Second, when people who don’t have Jesus are looking for Him, they are really looking for hope, peace, love, salvation. All these things are offered through Jesus Christ and we don’t have to BUY them. They are FREE to us. They came at a cost, but not to us. Jesus paid the cost when he died on the cross, taking all our sin upon him. He rose again on the 3rd day making the way for us to have His FREE gift of salvation through grace.

Romans 6:23 “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

And third, we should not be grabbing Jesus and hoarding Him to ourselves. We are to share Jesus with all those we come in contact with. His grace is big enough for everyone! We need to give Jesus away! Tell everyone we see who Jesus is and what He has done for us so that they too can find Jesus, take Him with them, and share Him with someone else.

A lot of campers went home with a Tiny Jesus in their backpacks, but more importantly, they went home with the real Jesus in their hearts. I pray that when they see their Tiny Jesus they are reminded of the REAL Jesus, the one who died for them so that they might live.