The Easter Story...for toddlers

I'm writing this while I distract my toddler with the DVD of "Tangled", so I'm still on mommy-duty today.  Forgive me if the post is disjointed or feels like it was written in spurts (because it was).

Last year, Easter with my son was pretty easy.  He was only 9 months old, so getting a bite of chocolate candy was the pinnacle of his involvement.

This year, he's already been in multiple Easter egg hunts, met the Easter Bunny, and has been taught the little story about what jelly bean colors mean.  (It only applies to basic colors, not Jelly Belly flavors like popcorn and margarita.)

And, judging by the way he is totally absorbed in the plot of "Tangled" (though his favorite character appears to be the horse), I feel like he's old enough to learn a little bit about the Easter Story.

But, obviously, I'm not going to give him the full "The Passion" rundown.  So, I think this is the gist of the Easter Story I'll tell my son.

God loves us very much, and he sent his Son down to Earth to live with us and teach us.  God's Son's name is Jesus.

Jesus came to Earth as a little baby, like your baby cousin, and when we have Christmas, it's because we're celebrating that he came down to us.

But Jesus, like all little babies, grew up.  When he grew up, he became a man, like Daddy and Poppa.  And he started teaching people all about God, like our pastors at church do.

Some of the people got mad about Jesus teaching the people about God.  So they did a very bad thing.  They decided to kill Jesus.

But Jesus knew what they were planning to do.  He let them catch him and he was killed, though he had never done anything wrong.

But, because Jesus is God's Son, he didn't stay dead.  He came back to life and taught the people for a little while longer, and then he went back to Heaven.

Everyone but Jesus does things wrong.  We all get mad, or act mean, and these bad things we do are sin.  Our sin makes it so we can't go to Heaven and be with God.

But when Jesus died, though he had done nothing wrong, he forgave us for all of our sin.  And all we have to is ask Him to forgive us, and to help us not do bad things anymore.

And that's why we celebrate Easter.  We celebrate because we're so happy that Jesus loved us so much that he died, and then came back to life, to forgive us for our sin and help us be with Him and God.

Okay, maybe it lacks a lot of biblical depth.  But I think, for now, that's a good way to sum up Easter for a not-yet-two-year-old.