Help Arrives One Holy Night 

     God tolerated our tarnished image for centuries. Then came time for repairing the damage to our moral likeness and intelligence. How could this be? 

     He appeared as he had done in the days of Abraham. This time, he arrived as a newborn baby, whose mother was a virgin. The glory of the Lord shown around humble shepherds, who were terrified. After the angels explained, they rushed to Bethlehem, the town of David, saw the baby, and spread the news. 

     Intelligent rulers didn't believe. King Herod believed something! God who creates trillions of sperm cells over the centuries would have no problem supplying one cell to the virgin, if that's what happened. Earlier, the angel Gabriel visited Mary, explaining, the "Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the Most High will over-shadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God." 

     The baby was given the name Jesus. By age 12 he knew God was his Father. At the Feast of the Passover his worried family found him mixing with teachers at the temple courts. He explained: "Why were you searching for me? Didn't you know I had to be in my Father's house?"

     Jesus, the Christ/Messiah, took our sins on himself, his human form crucified, and appeared to his astonished disciples as Lord. He offers eternal life. He calls on those who have received the Holy Spirit to witness for him and his salvation, to the ends of the earth (Matthew 28:18-20), and to be the light of the world and salt of the earth (Matthew 5:13-16). 

     Responsibilities never cease.