The Nativity

I’ve always been drawn to nativity scenes— to their simplicity, their story and the hope and wonder that fill my heart every time I see one.

The word “nativity” comes from Latin, meaning “birth.” These scenes show the Holy Family (Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus) gathered in a humble manger with animals looking on. They’re meant to symbolize faith, family, and the mystery of God becoming human in a very humble setting.

When I was a young girl growing up in Warner Robins, Georgia, there was a church just five minutes from our house that staged a live nativity in the days before Christmas. I remember sometimes driving by and other times standing out in the cool December air with my mom and siblings, bundled up in our coats, watching people dressed as Mary and Joseph gathered around a manger. There were wise men, shepherds, farm animals, and even a baby portraying Jesus. Santa Claus aside, something about seeing that ancient story come to life right there in my hometown made Christmas feel so real.

When I was in junior high, Mom decided to buy a nativity scene for our front yard from the Spiegel catalog. When it arrived a few weeks before Christmas, several of us gathered in the yard to set it up. The figurines were made of painted plastic, each lit from within by a single bulb, glowing in the darkness. We transformed our old redwood picnic table into a small, makeshift manger, scattered a bale or two of straw around, and hung a big, bright star over the scene. For years, we’d set up that nativity, and then we’d walk out into the street to see what it looked like to the neighbors driving by. Our Old English Sheepdog, Boaz, made it even more memorable—he was known for curling up in the hay right beside baby Jesus, which always made us laugh.

Years later, when my husband and I traveled to Europe, we spent hours in massive cathedrals, craning our necks to admire painted frescoes on walls and ceilings. Those religious stories, especially depictions of Jesus’ birth, took our breath away.

But my most treasured nativity scene came to me just over ten years ago. I’d written an article for a regional magazine about an outdoor art project called the “Rock Garden” tucked behind the Seventh-Day Adventist Church near my house. The artist was DeWitt Boyd, though everyone around here called him “Old Dog” at the time. He was quirky, interesting, and immensely talented.

After the article came out, people started visiting the garden and sending donations. He called to thank me and said he had something he wanted to give me. When I met him at the Rock Garden, he and some volunteers presented me with a small nativity scene he’d molded from clay or resin. Mary holds baby Jesus while Joseph stands beside them with a lantern. Surrounding them are a mouse, two ewes, a raccoon, a donkey, a bunny, a cow, a chicken, a dove, and at Mary’s feet, a brown dog.

Old Dog pointed to the dog and said, “That’s me. That’s Old Dog. I am God’s faithful servant.”

I keep that nativity here in my office. I love to study the figurines’ faces and to touch the little animals with my fingertips as I contemplate the birth of Jesus.

I’ll always be captivated by nativity scenes, by paintings and sculptures of Mary and her son. They will always take me back to a time when I possessed a child-like wonder and imagination, when magic felt possible and the world was full of light— so full of light—from a star leading us home. Merry Christmas!