Easter - The Last Days of Christ

I wanted to send our missionaries something that would bring the true meaning of Easter into their lives during Passion Week - or the week leading up to Easter Sunday.  I came up with the idea of an Easter Advent calendar where they would have something to open each day.  There are lots of ideas floating around on Pinterest and on the Internet but Mason comes home soon and I didn't want him to think that he had to haul anything around with him for these last few months.  Totally start to freak out whenever I think about his homecoming = Aahhhhh!!! We're just a wee bit excited around here. Sorry, I'll try to stay focused...

What started out to be a fun 'little' project totally morphed into this 'thing' that has taken me literally weeks to put together.  Thinking that it would be amazing to follow along with Christ's Last Days, I came up with the idea of putting a bookmark with scriptural references inside plastic Easter eggs, each egg would represent a single day in Christ's life.  Opening my scriptures I was brought to remembrance of just how much happened that last week.  The week was full of parables and symbolism and illegal events all culminating in Christ's crucifixion.  It was plain to see that this would not all fit on a bookmark - so it morphed from a bookmark into a bookmark and a handout - which I tried to keep concise and short although you will think that Thursday and Friday are anything BUT short. 

I thought this would be so easy.  Surely someone, somewhere has put together the events of Christ's last days and I could benefit by simply cutting and pasting.  You know the story: Modern technology meets another one of my hair brained ideas.  Alas, where I could find lots of information online, a lot of it contradicted each other and I wanted to insert our latter-day perspective into the mix.  Hence my odyssey of discovery through the four Gospel's, Jesus the Christ by James E. Talmage, Life and Teachings of Jesus - New Testament Study Guide Religion 211, and The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah by Alfred Edersheim (who incidentally was the first Jew to join the Church 1825-1889 and was a brilliant scholar).   This is NOT my own work.  A lot of it is typed just as it is found in the books and melded together into a cohesive and understandable mix.  In hindsight, I am grateful for the opportunity that I had to reacquaint myself with Passion Week.  This Easter season promises to be a special one for me.

The Last Days of Christ - There are nine eggs each representing a day leading up to Resurrection Sunday.  Inside each egg is a bookmark that has the scriptural events that happened for that particular day.  Also included is a handout representing each day in the same corresponding color as the bookmark.  Label each egg with a number representing which egg to open first.  I also included a little cover sheet telling our missionaries what to do. PDF printable links are below.  Enjoy!

Last Days of Christ - cover sheet

Last Days of Christ - bookmark/egg insert

Last Days of Christ - daily handout

Just in case you have missionaries in a foreign land where it is just too expensive to mail a bunch of eggs, I've created envelope labels.  Just print them out and glue onto the front of a business size envelope (to fit 8.5x11 inch paper).  Fill in the date that you would like your missionary to open each envelope and insert the daily handout/editorial and bookmark/egg insert and seal.  Now you won't have to worry about the added expense of a package and when you fill out those nasty little customs declarations you can just write 'letters'.  Win, win!

Last Days of Christ - envelope labels