Building Christmas values

The hammering was deafening, the scene looked chaotic and Mike Young loved it.  Young was working with some of the families scattered about the lobby of Parkway Baptist Church in the Moseley community of Chesterfield County, making mangers. The effort is one of the undertakings of the Noble Warriors Christian ministry for men, and Young is the group’s director and creator of the program.

“It’s crazy fun,” he declared.

The manger-building project started about six years ago with Young working with his three sons in the garage. In 2004, Young invited others to join, and the effort has since grown in participants and sites.

Parkway, where 44 families were registered to participate, was one of 13 places in the Richmond area where mangers were assembled yesterday, as well as at locations in Fredericksburg and Hampton Roads, and in four other states.

“Everyone is a winner,” Young said. “The children are happy that Dad is spending time with them. Mom is happy to have a few hours to herself on the Saturday before Christmas, and Dad feels awesome when he actually leads his family to celebrate Christ at Christmas.”

Group officials say the event is a way to empower men to lead their families and provides tools to teach their children the spiritual truth about the significance of Christmas.

All the material is donated; the wood is precut and only has to be assembled and nailed.

Noble Warriors encourages the family to place the manger in front of the Christmas tree and provides a list of discussion topics for the week that includes talking about the significance of the gifts being exchanged and the gifts God has given the family.

“It’s more of a hands-on tool for the dads to take Christmas home to the house,” said Rich Babbitt, a member of the Noble Warriors board of directors. “We give Dad a tool to explain Christmas.”

For Easter, the manger can be taken apart and reassembled as a cross to be placed outside.

The Rev. Brian Autry of Parkway Baptist has made a tradition the past three years of making a manger with his 6-year-old son, Mark. “It’s interactive, so he likes it,” Autry said. “This is a concrete way that helps Mark understand what I believe is the real meaning of Christmas, which is to celebrate the birth of Christ.”

Chris Deckert, a member of the church’s congregation, was attending his first manger build with sons Caleb, 8, and Nate, 7. “It’s just something like a fun project to do with the boys,” he said. “(You) get to work with your hands and do something that has to do with the true meaning of Christmas.”