DEC. 1
ONCE UPON A NON-TIME
//In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. (Genesis 1:1)//
[[Once upon a time...]]
or
[[Once upon a NON-time...]]Once upon a time, there was a squid, a non-magical liger and a spaceship. But that's a story for another time.
[[Once upon a NON-time...]]
[[NO! Tell me about the liger!]]Most stories start like this: “Once upon a time . . .”
Not this one. It can’t. It’s impossible.
Instead, the Christmas story starts like this:
Once upon a non-time, there is God.
[[Hmm. That’s weird!]]
[[Makes sense!]]Any non-magical liger story is boring. I'm telling you, go read the [[Once upon a NON-time...]] story.
[[No, I'm in too deep, now. I'll risk the boring liger story.]]There's no story except this:
Once upon a time, there was a squid, a non-magical liger and a spaceship.
The squid was strapped with a leather belt to the back of the liger. The countdown timer ticked down from 10, 9, 8, 7...
The liger was buckled in the cockpit.
You're right, this is too weird. Take me back to the [[Once upon a NON-time...]] story.
or
[[How in the world did this start?!]]The quest for magical powers started six generations before this with a family of circus performers seeking to enhance their act with dazzling magic tricks. They tried every hocus-pocus spell imaginable, realizing all were frauds.
One day, Sergei Kravinoff, the youngest brother to seven bearded sisters, himself unbearded, stumbled across a gypsy.
"I can provide you magical powers," the gypsy promised him.
"You can?" Sergei cried. "Maybe my family could finally be proud of me!"
What does Sergei do?
[[Follows the gypsy]]
[[Calls him a fraud]]Sergei follows the gypsy into the wooden wagon, where the gypsy begins explaining the process:
"First, strap a six-inch squid to the back of a common liger. No questions, no questions. Just do it.
"Next, launch the liger near to the //magicarius// star. If he looks at the star while in space, when he returns, he will emmanate a magical aura that will grant you unlimited acrobatic flips, lucious beards on your sisters, and levitating elephants."
[[Sergei gets to work]]"I think it's too good to be true." Sergei says skeptically. "Everything I've tried so far has been fake."
"I'm no fake!" the gypsy replies, offended. "It is YOU who have not tried hard enough. I promise, if you launch a liger into space, if he looks at the //magicarius// star, he will return with magical powers that will make your circus the sensation of the century!"
[[Sergei gets to work]]Scraping together all their life savings from six generations of circus work, the family--convinced by Sergei's enthusiam--procured a rocket, a liger, a leather strap, and a six-inch squid.
The rocket launched into space and returned 18 hours later.
When they opened the hatch and led the ligur out, no one felt anything. No rush of magic. No blue ball of power. No... nothing. Only a tramatized ligur with a dead squid strapped to its back.
"Maybe the liger forgot to look at //magicarius//," said Sergei's father, disappointed. "We told him specifically where to look. I expected so much more."
Kind of like what you expected from this story.
THE END.
[[Once upon a...]]But this is the greatest story ever told, so it needs to be weird. It’s different from other stories. It’s better.
Christmas is a story about God, but it’s not a story about a God that used to be. It is a story about the God who is. Right now, he still is.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let me back up.
Once upon a non-time, there was eternity.
Was eternity a long time ago?
[[Yes]]
[[Nope]]No, it doesn't! Humans can't even comprehend non-time (eternity!). But that's what the Bible says!
[[Hmm. That’s weird!]]Are you sure? How long ago was it?
A year ago? (How old were you?)
Ten years ago? 100 years ago? 1000 years ago? 8 million years ago?!
[[Nope]]Was eternity a super long time ago? Nope.
Eternity is . . . forever. It never started.
God is eternal. God never started. He was always there.
And for all eternity, God saw you. You! He knew you’d be reading this story today! He knew what you’d be doing yesterday. He sees tomorrow like it already happened.
God is so powerful that He created the world by talking: “Let there be _________.” You fill in the blank. Let there be light? If God said it, there was light. Let there be trees? Yep. God said that, and there were trees . . . and stars and birds and people and mountains and water and . . . everything!
Before he created the world, God had a master plan—a plan that included you. His plan is for everything to be good, and for everyone to be with him forever.
But men sinned.
[[Not me!]]
[[Thankfully, there's an answer.<-That's true. So?]]Yep. Even you.
Have you ever lied?
[[yep!]]
[[No, never]]See, that's a sin! That's breaking God's laws--like the 10 commandments--and God calls that sin.
[[Thankfully, there's an answer.]]That's a lie! And that's breaking one of God's commandments, which is called //sin.// The other commandments are things like not putting anything before God, not stealing, and not dishonoring your parents.
[[Thankfully, there's an answer.]]Sin separates people from God.
Thankfully, God’s plan has a way to fix this sin problem. God gave all people a gift—a perfect gift of perfect eternity with him.
This gift was a baby, God’s Son.
This baby came to take away sin. It started about 2,000 years ago in a manger in Bethlehem . . .
Wait a minute. There I go again, getting ahead of myself!
Do you think God is rude?
You’ll have to wait until tomorrow to continue the Christmas story about God’s gift.