A friend gave me a copy of The Action Bible, a super-hero-type colored comics version of the whole Bible. I don’t usually read from it, but I got it out the other day to read the Christmas story to my almost 8- and 6-year old granddaughters, Raegan and Ruby. The pictures captivated these girls and we got all the way through without any distractions. Obviously, to make room for all the action figures, they leave a lot out, but they did do a good job summarizing the story.
I was pleased that they interrupted me several times to fill in the blanks with how the whole story comes together. They knew there were important parts of the story left out. And, the dramatic color picture of the blonde Angel Gabriel got them off chasing a rabbit about fallen angels and how ugly they were. Since this was a bedtime story, I didn’t want them going to bed thinking about ugly fallen angels that killed babies, so we wrapped up the story talking about how Jesus came so that bad, ugly people could become beautiful people. So, I think I salvaged the end of the story.
The Christmas story should be a bit of action in our lives. There is a good and bad spirit in the world. And I want to make sure I influence the good side, not the bad. Merry Christmas!
My Mom used to hide the wrapped Christmas gifts in the hallway closet. They would remain hidden there until we all went to bed on Christmas Eve. Once everyone was asleep, these same gifts somehow appeared under the Christmas tree, to be discovered Christmas morning. The tags said they were from Santa, but my sister and I knew they were the same gifts hidden under the coats in the closet days before Christmas.
It became a challenge to us to somehow peak under the folds of the wrapping paper to get a hint as to what was inside that gift with my name on it. Sometimes we got a little too aggressive and ripped the paper. That made it easier to see the gift itself, but all the harder to keep the secret that we now knew.
And I don’t recall Mom ever getting mad at us for being in the search party. That’s kind of like God not getting mad at us when we try to search Him out. He wants us to get a little aggressive under the wrapping to find out what’s in there. And how fulfilling it is when we finally discover the gifts He has prepared for us. Let’s discover what He’s hidden for us.
“It is the glory of God is conceal a thing; but the honor of kings is to search out a matter” (Proverbs 25:2 KJV).