Re-enact Three Famous Jesus Miracles! (Perfect for a Church, Sunday School or Bible Study Group Sketch)

Is your church looking for a way to make the Bible come alive? Why not put on a sketch that re-enacts one of the miracles of Jesus?

Which is your favorite Jesus miracle? Raising Lazarus? That’s a good one for sure. Raising the widow’s son? Another fine miracle. But, frankly, all a resurrection consists of is one person laying down and Jesus telling them to stand up, which they then do. Not much drama really.

One of my favorite miracles was when Jesus cast the demons into the herd of swine. Obviously, it’s not suitable for a church sketch, but I really like this one. Remember how they ran into the lake and drowned? It doesn’t say how many there were, but, “a whole herd” sounds like a lot. Maybe dozens of drowned hogs, floating around for days, buzzards standing on the shore waiting for a favorable wind.

If I could do that on the ranch, my hog population would drop significantly and every rancher in Texas would hire me for God knows how much to get rid of pigs. Trouble is, I would need some demoniacs with lots of demons and I’d be scared as hell if I ran into demoniacs. Most likely place I can think of on the ranch to meet some would be at the low water crossing near the corral. That’s a scary place at night. Deep crossing with tall trees, branches hanging down, snakes all over the place. Owls hootin. Gives me the creeps just thinking about it.

Can you imagine? Two o’clock in the morning, pitch black dark, I’m in the ATV, no windows, no doors, looking for hogs to shoot, easing across the creek and when I come to the top of the hill on the other side, holy shit! Two naked guys, with cuts all over their bodies, walk out of the woods, into my headlights and stop me:

”What do we have to do with thee Ferrell, hast thou come to torment us before the time?”

Damn, I’d be spooked. I’d jump out of the ATV and run off in all directions, screaming like a little girl. However, now that I’ve thought about the money angle in advance, I might be able to pull myself together, stay put and talk to them:

“How y’all doin?”

“We entreat thee Ferrell, if you are going to cast us out, send us into the herd of swine!”

“You boys interested in making some money?”

I would charge ranchers and farmers up front, which would require some proof I could actually do what I was sayin. Might get one of the demoniacs to go around with me and just call out a couple demons, sic ‘em on a pig, then try to get them to go back in the guy so I didn’t waste any demons on demos.

This scenario is not impossible, Jesus stumbled on these guys all over the place and I know they’re in America (See below, A Brush With Death and Demons)

One thing though, pigs are pretty good swimmers. I’ve seen ‘em swim a swollen river and drowning them in a stock pond would require some effort on the part of the demon. Then, of course, you’d have to fish them out of the pond before they poisoned the water.

Maybe I could get the demons to make the pigs throw their self against trees or choke on acorns or something. Anyway, I’d have to work all that out before I tried to sell my services.

So, back to something suitable for a sketch, I would go for one of the spit miracles. I like these because they are unusual, interesting, relatively unknown, yet easy to re-enact before an audience and visually stunning. These miracles would make great sketches for your local church, Sunday school or Bible study group.

Here’s one:

Mark 8:23-24 “and having taken the hand of the blind man, he led him forth without the village, and having spit into his eyes, having put [his] hands on him, he was questioning him if he doth behold anything.

And he looked up, and said, I see men as trees, walking.

After that he put his hands again upon his eyes, and made him look up: and he was restored, and saw every man clearly.”

A little background to the miracle. Jesus is walking through a town after recently feeding the four thousand, His disciples are working the crowd and find a blind man which they bring to Jesus. He then takes the man out of town and heals him.

So here’s a suggested script:

CHARACTERS: Jesus, blind man, one disciple (remember, the guy’s blind and someone needs to lead him).

NOTE: You may have difficulty finding someone in your congregation willing to play the blind man. Many people are probably reluctant to have another congregant spit in their eyes, even though Jesus did it. This is understandable.

Here is my suggestion, find a desperate, homeless person to play the blind man. Offer him $10 to start with and go to no more than $15. You can almost certainly find someone who will do it for $15. Promise lunch after the sketch while you tell him about Jesus.

Now, it is important to explain to the person exactly what’s going to happen. If the homeless person is taken by surprise when Jesus spits in the first eye, he is almost certainly going to shut both eyes and spoil the sketch. If he agrees to do the part, but then keeps his eyes shut anyway, don’t pay him, don’t feed him lunch and don’t tell him about Jesus. If you do, word will spread in the homeless community overnight and you may as well forget about finding another participant.

SETTING: Outside of town; need at least one, large potted plant. Place plant in the middle of the platform, toward the back.

ACTION: Jesus and the disciple are in the back of the church/room; the blind man is sitting on the floor to one side. The disciple goes to the blind man, helps him up and takes him to Jesus.

DISCIPLE: “Jesus, are you willing to heal this blind man?”

JESUS: No reply, takes blind man by the hand and all actors walk to front of church, up on platform.

ACTION: Jesus and blind man face each other with audience to the right side of Jesus. Disciple stands on the other side of them, facing audience. (Note: move pulpit out of the way before sketch begins.)

(If you have an organist or pianist, she might play “Be Thou My Vision,” beginning in adagio, building in crescendo to the actual spit scene and then diminuendo to the end of the act.)

While the blind man looks at Jesus, Jesus works up some spit, then (music at crescendo) spits in one of the blind man’s eyes. It doesn’t matter which one first. (Now, remember, this is probably the first time the homeless person has had someone spit in his eye. Additionally, he’s likely to have a mental problem; so, if he happens to snap and attack Jesus, be sure the disciple is ready to step in.)

If the first eye spit goes okay, Jesus can then spit in the blind man’s other eye.

ACTION: Jesus puts his hands on the blind man.

JESUS: Can you see?

BLIND MAN: (Looks at potted plant) I see men as trees walking.

ACTION: Jesus puts his hands on the blind mans eyes.

BLIND MAN: I can see!

(Disciple takes paper towel from pocket, gives to blind man to wipe the spit out of his eyes, cast takes bow and congregation applauds.)

Okay, so you can see how simple and dramatic this sketch could be. The tension will be palpable while Jesus is working up spit for the first shot – you can bet everyone will be on the edge of their seat watching to see what the homeless person does. If he dorks out and jumps on Jesus, the guy who played Jesus will never live it down and probably quit the church. But, if all goes well, you might consider doing the other two spit miracles, maybe work one in every other Sunday or so.

One is in Mark 7:33 where Jesus comes up on a deaf mute; he sticks His fingers in the man’s ears then, and this could be powerful with the correct lighting, Jesus spits on His fingers and wipes the spit on the guys tongue. Yeah. Some translations hide the spit wipe part and just say “Jesus spit” like He was spitting out a hair or something; but the Greek says He “spit on his fingers.” (I would have Jesus wear flesh colored exam gloves.)

The last one is John 9:6 where Jesus spits in the dirt, makes a little mud pie, and rubs it on the man’s eyes. Presumably, on his eyelids; if your interpretation is that the mud was rubbed on the man’s actual eye balls, I wouldn’t try this one. You would certainly run into legal problems.

So, there you are. No doubt your pastors and Sunday school teachers are very interesting and engaging, but everyone enjoys some variety; perhaps a few sketches would expand your church’s outreach. Good luck!

(If your church or other religious organization is interested in more exciting ideas about how to spread the message of God’s word, contact Ferrell’s Faith & Fun Ministry at this website.)