Video: Hilarious moment 'sheep' kidnaps baby Jesus during preschool Christmas pageant
A young girl in an animal costume took the doll from the crib and started to play with it during the performance.
For those familiar with the nativity story, Mary and Joseph found shelter in a manger and that was where Jesus was born. They had to keep company with only the farm animals until they got visited by shepherds and the three wise men. Now, where in the story did one of the sheep kidnap the baby and refuse to give him back?
That however, was the case at a recent annual Christmas event in Tennessee. A nativity play at the First Baptist Church of White Pine went off script when a preschooler acting as one of the sheep, decided to take the baby Jesus doll and keep it for herself.
While the rest of the children sang Away in The Manger, Teegan Benson picked up the prop and started playing with it.
"My daughter has a great love for babies," the two-year-old's mother Tana Benson told the Todd Starnes Radio Show. "She had her eye on baby Jesus for quite a while during the show... and she found Jesus to be irresistible."
As in any other scenario, no mother is going to be happy about a sheep stealing their baby, so was the case at the pageant as well. The girl playing Mary was not ready to allow the disruption, not to mention incorrect telling of the story, and tried to get the doll back.
What ensued was a tug of war between the two until finally, someone stepped in and stopped the fight.
"The little girl playing Mary is a middle child and a real stickler for the rules, and she knew that was not supposed to happen," Benson told NBC News. "When I went up to take Teegan's hand and walk her off the stage, the little girl playing Mary said, 'She touched the baby Jesus! We weren't supposed to touch the baby Jesus!'"
"My little sheep took the baby Jesus, breaking all the rules leaving poor little Mary no choice but to take action! Momma to the rescue tried her best to protect her baby at all costs. Definitely a program I will remember. LOVE these kiddos and my church family! Laughed so hard I cried!" Benson wrote in a Facebook post, where she shared a video of the hilarious play.
Since posting the video on 10 December, Benson has received 9.1 million views.