I remember the first time I ever heard the story that follows. I was driving in my car in the mountains of northeast Georgia. I remember being moved to tears as Paul Harvey, in his most eloquent manner, told this story. In fact, my eyes were filling with tears so much I had to pullover or run the risk of driving down the side of a mountain. Yet, even today, as I reprint this wonderful Christmas story, I am forever reminded of God's great love for you and me...and for the sacrifice that Jesus made to come to earth as a baby, die on a cross and then be raised to new life so that one day, ALL WHO BELIEVE IN THE MATCHLESS NAME OF JESUS AND THE WORK ACCOMPLISHED ON THAT CROSS WILL LIFE WITH HIM...FOREVER!!!!
So enjoy this story and the little poem that follows and when given the chance this holiday season, wish all you know a MERRY CHRISTMAS...FOR CHRIST IS THE REASON FOR THIS SEASON!!!!
A reprint of my former blog begins with The Man and the Birds...A Christmas Story Each year at Christmas, I eagerly search across my radio dial trying to find the story of the Man and the Birds, as told my Paul Harvey. I find that in listening to that story, I am so wonderfully reminded of the love of God for each of us. On many occasions, I have been forced to pull off on the side of the road to listen to the conclusion of the story…it’s so hard to drive when your eyes are water-logged and leaking.
I hope and pray that during this Christmas season, you will have the wonderful opportunity to hear Mr. Harvey’s captivating telling of this timeless story…of Emmanuel, God with us. If not, then please read on and be forever blessed to know that the love of God was expressed…in human form…in a manager in
The Man and the Birds by Paul Harvey:
The man to whom I'm going to introduce you was not a scrooge; he was a kind decent, mostly good man. He was generous to his family and always upright in his dealings with other men. But he just didn't believe all that incarnation stuff which the churches proclaim at Christmas Time. It just didn't make sense and he was too honest to pretend otherwise. He just couldn't swallow the Jesus Story, about God coming to Earth as a man.
"I'm truly sorry to distress you," he told his wife, "but I'm not going with you to church this Christmas Eve." He said he'd feel like a hypocrite. That he'd much rather just stay at home, but that he would wait up for them. And so he stayed and they went to the midnight service.
Shortly after the family drove away in the car, snow began to fall. He went to the window to watch the flurries getting heavier and heavier and then went back to his fireside chair and began to read his newspaper. Minutes later he was startled by a thudding sound...Then another, and then another. Sort of a thump or a thud...At first he thought someone must be throwing snowballs against his living room window. But when he went to the front door to investigate, he found a flock of birds huddled miserably in the snow. They'd been caught in the storm and, in a desperate search for shelter, had tried to fly through his large living room window.
Well, he couldn't let the poor creatures lie there and freeze, so he thought of the barn where his children stabled their pony; surely that would provide a warm shelter, if he could direct the birds to it. Quickly he put on a coat, galoshes, tramped through the deepening snow to the barn. He opened the doors wide and turned on a light, but the birds did not come in. He figured food would entice them in. So he hurried back to the house, fetched bread crumbs, sprinkled them on the snow, making a trail to the yellow-lighted wide open doorway of the stable. But to his dismay, the birds ignored the bread crumbs, and continued to flap around helplessly in the snow. He tried catching them...He tried shooing them into the barn by walking around them waving his arms...Instead, they scattered in every direction, except into the warm, lighted barn.
And then, he realized that they were afraid of him. To them, he reasoned, I am a strange and terrifying creature. If only I could think of some way to let them know that they can trust me...That I am not trying to hurt them, but to help them… But how?....since any move he made tended to frighten them, confuse them. They just would not follow. They would not be led or shooed because they feared him.
"If only I could be a bird," he thought to himself, "and mingle with them and speak their language. Then I could tell them not to be afraid. Then I could show them the way to the safe, warm barn. But I would have to be one of them so they could see and hear and understand." At that moment the church bells began to ring. The sound reached his ears above the whistling of the wind. As he stood there listening to the bells ….listening to the bells pealing forth the glad tidings of Christmas, he understood …. And he sank to his knees in the snow.
I trust that this Christmas, when you hear those church bells ring or the sounds of carolers lifting their voices in praise to the newborn babe, you too, will understand the message of Christmas….
Jesus Christ is born and Emmanuel.....GOD IS FOREVER WITH US!!!
Merry Christmas….Happy Birthday, Jesus!
WPQ
The Truth of Christmas
Of that night so long ago;
When the shepherds left their flocks
And to Bethlehem did go...
There to find a tiny babe
And a maiden so young and fair.
They could not fully understand
It was God who was lying there.
The babe was wrapped in swaddling clothes,
Yet, no crying did he make;
And the message of the angels
To the silent town they'd take.
So all who they encountered
Would know that on this wondrous night;
The King of Heaven had come to earth
And darkness was expelled by the LIGHT....
AND THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD IS JESUS!!!!!
W. Patrick Queen © December 2019
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