The Christmas Story
(paraphrased for young ears)


Many, many years ago God looked down upon the earth and saw, that people were very bad, really bad. There were wars everywhere. People were killing each other. Some were greedy and would not share with those who were less fortunate. That made God very sad, and He called a conference with Jesus and the Holy Spirit. He told them how sad He was that the people He had made in His own image were so bad. He said, nobody would be good enough to spend eternity in Heaven, and wouldn’t it have been better not to have made any people at all. “We can just spend eternity with the angels”, He said. “They love Us and worship Us, but it is still very sad.” Then Jesus spoke and said: “Father, I have an idea. What if someone would go to earth and preach the Good News to them. Maybe they would turn from their wicked ways, and then they could all go to Heaven.” But God the Father said: “That won’t be enough. They will never be good enough, and I will have to punish them. That is going to hurt me very much, unless, of course, someone would be willing to take their place.” If someone else, who is good, were willing to take their punishment on Himself, then My need for justice would be satisfied, and I could forgive them for being so bad, and then they could come to Heaven after all. After a short moment of silence, Jesus said: “Father, if it is ok with You, I will go and take their place,” whereupon the Father said: “You are my beloved Son, I knew You would be willing to be the sacrifice, as if You were a lamb, led to the slaughter.” If You bring this sacrifice, You will be richly rewarded, because when you come back to Heaven, You will sit at my right Hand, and many people will call You their Savior, and they will worship You.”

So God the Father said: “Where would You like to be born, in a palace, among the wealthy?”, but Jesus said: “O, no, Father, if I did that, all the poor people would reject me, because I would not be one of them. I will have to be born under the poorest circumstances in the whole wide world,” to which the Father said: “I knew, You would say that, because I know everything. I have already picked a girl to be Your earthly mother. Her name is Mary, and she lives in Nazareth. I will dispatch the Archangel Gabriel to her to inform her, so that she will not be scared, when all of a sudden she notices that she is pregnant.”

Sure enough, one day Mary was sitting in her living room, thinking about how wonderful God was, because she had just been promised in marriage to a wonderful young man by the name of Joseph, in other words, she was in love. He was a carpenter, which was a big deal, because that meant that he would be able to take care of her and the baby. In those days most people worked as day laborers, and that was not a very secure way of making a living. Day laborers worked on some days and on others they did not, and when they did not work, they earned no money, and that meant, that they had nothing to eat that day. But God saw to it, that His Son would not have to go hungry, while He was here on earth.

To make matters worse, when Jesus was about to enter this earth in the form of a baby, a Roman emperor by the name of Augustus had ordered that all the people he ruled, would have to be counted, because he was a prideful man and wanted to know, if he was ruler over more people than anybody else. To make sure, that no one was forgotten, everybody had to go to the city they were from. That meant that Joseph and Mary had to return to Bethlehem, where his family was from. When they arrived there, they could not find a hotel room, and Mary was about to have her baby. Finally the owner of the only hotel in town took compassion on them and offered them a place in his stable with the horses and the cows, and that is where the baby Jesus was born into this earth.

However, God wanted to make sure that Jesus had some kind of reception, so he sent a whole bunch of Angels to some shepherds, who were watching their sheep out in the fields around Bethlehem, to announce to them that Jesus had been born in a stable. You see, shepherds were not very highly regarded in Israel in those days. They were considered unclean, because they always had to touch dirty animals, so for example they were not allowed to go into the temple. That is the way God is: He likes to accept things that man rejects, because He doesn’t have to impress anybody. You can ‘t even imagine how surprised and scared those shepherds were. They had never seen anything like it. But when the Angels had left, they made their way into Bethlehem, and sure enough, what do you know, they found the baby, and the baby was so beautiful, that they could not keep their eyes off of Him, and that is the story of how Jesus, who would grow up into the most remarkable human being who ever walked the earth, was born, and eventually He would be nailed to a cross by the very people He came to save. And so, everybody who believes in Him will not be lost, but will be allowed to go to Heaven, to live forever and ever with God the Father, Jesus and the Holy Spirit and all the loved ones who have gone before.