By Dan Harper

In 1892, a Unitarian painter named Edward Emerson Simmons painted a picture of Jesus. Since people say that Joseph, the father of Jesus, was a carpenter, Simmons decided to show Jesus as an ordinary boy, sitting in a carpenter’s shop. And, because no one knows what Jesus really looked like, he decided to make Jesus look just like his own son, with blond hair. He called his painting The Carpenter’s Son.

In the painting you see Jesus sitting on a sawhorse. He was supposed to be sweeping up the shavings and sawdust, but he has dropped his broom, and sits there staring off into space. In the background, you can see his parents looking at him, and you can imagine they are saying, “What are we going to do with that boy? He has forgotten to sweep the floor, and he sits there daydreaming.”

When Simmons finished his painting, many people didn’t like it. They did not like to imagine Jesus as an ordinary boy because he grew up to be so special. Finally, a Unitarian woman named Amelia Jones bought the painting. When she died she gave it to her Unitarian church, First Unitarian in New Bedford, Mass. Last year, the church decided the painting should be in a museum where more people could see it, so today it is in the Rotch-Jones- Duff House Museum in New Bedford.

Download and print a coloring page (PDF) of Simmons picture of Jesus. Draw Jesus the way you imagine him to be and color in the picture.