Welcome Churh Family to eHomily
   
Pastor Ron Harvey 

 

 

I love the story written by Paul Harvey called The Christmas Storm:

 

This is about a modern man, one of us, who was not a scrooge, and who was a kind, decent, mostly good man, generous to his family, upright in his dealings with others. But he did not believe in all that incarnation stuff that churches proclaim at Christmas time. It just didn't make sense to him and he was too honest to pretend otherwise. He just could not 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 to church with you this Christmas Eve." He said he'd feel like a hypocrite. That he would much rather stay home, but that he would wait for them. He stayed, they went.

 

Shortly after the family drove away in the family car, snow began to fall. He went to the window to watch the flurries getting heavier and heavier, then went back to his fireside chair to begin to read his newspaper. Minutes later he was startled by a thudding sound. Then another and another. At first he thought someone must be throwing snowballs against his living room window. Well, he went to the front door, and he found a flock of birds huddled miserably in the snow. They had been caught in the storm and in a desperate search for shelter they had tried to fly through his large landscape window. Well, he couldn't let the poor creatures lie there and freeze. He remembered the barn where his children stabled their pony. That would provide a warm shelter - if he could direct the birds to it.

 

He quickly put on his coat and galoshes, trampled through the deepening snow to the barn, opened the door wide, and turned on a light. But the birds did not come in. He figured food would entice them in and 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 bead 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 in to the warm lighted barn. Then he realized 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 they can trust me, that I'm not trying to hurt them, but to help them. How? 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 myself, he thought, and mingle with them and speak their language, and tell them not to be afraid, and 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 sound of the wind. He stood there listening to the bells playing Adeste Fidelis. Listening to the bells pealing the glad tidings of Christmas, he sank to his knees in the snow. 

(By Paul Harvey)

 

I would only add to this story: Here is a man who finally understood it in his heart. This is where the gospel is fully realized. I hope the light of the gospel has shined in your heart as well! (John 3:16)

 

*Please take the opportunity to sit down together and share this story with your family or send it to your friends.

 

See you Sunday in worship as we consider the Amazing Journey of the Wisemen in the Gospel story (Mathew 2:1-12).

 

Very Important: Invite friends and family to our Christmas Eve services and music presentations. 

 

Christmas Blessings,

Pastor Ron 

 

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