There was once a man who didn't believe in God and he
didn't hesitate to let others know that he felt religion and religious holidays
were a lot of childish fairy tales. He said that religion was a crutch for
people who were too stupid to figure things out for themselves or too fearful to
live by their own strength. If God were real He sure wouldn't do some of the
dumb things people said He did.
His wife, however, did believe in God and was always quick to say that she was
born again. She raised their children to also have faith in God despite his
disparaging comments.
One snowy evening, his wife was taking their children to a Christmas church
service in the farm community in which they lived. She asked him, as always to
come, but he refused. "What a lot of nonsense!" he said. "Why would God lower
Himself to come to Earth as a man? That's ridiculous!" So she and the children
left, and he stayed home.
While they were gone, the wind and snow grew stronger until it was a blizzard.
As the man looked out the window, all he saw was a blinding snowstorm. He sat
down to relax before the fire. He knew his wife would not venture back on the
road till the storm abated and he knew there were good snow tires on their
vehicle. So, nothing to do except enjoy the peaceful evening.
Then he heard a loud thump. Something had hit the window. Then another thump. He
looked out, but couldn't see more than a few feet. When the snow let up a
little, he ventured outside to see what could have been beating on his window.
In the field near his house he saw a flock of wild geese. Apparently they had
been flying south for the winter when they got caught in the snowstorm and
couldn't go on. They were lost and stranded by this storm. They just flapped
their wings and flew around the field in low circles, blindly and aimlessly. A
couple of them had flown into his window, it seemed. The man felt sorry for the
geese and wanted to help them. The barn would be a great place for them to stay,
he thought. It's warm and safe; surely they could spend the night and wait out
the storm.
So he walked over to the barn and opened the doors wide, then watched and
waited, hoping they would notice the open barn and go inside. But the geese just
fluttered around aimlessly and didn't seem to notice the barn or realize what it
could mean for them. The man tried to get their attention, but that just seemed
to scare them and they moved further away.
He went into the house and came with some bread, broke it up, and made a bread
crumb trail leading to the barn. They still didn't catch on. Now he was getting
frustrated. He got behind them and tried to shoo them toward the barn, but they
only got more scared and scattered in every direction except toward the barn.
Nothing he did could get them to go into the barn where they would be warm and
safe.
"Why don't they follow me?!" he exclaimed. "Can't they see this is the only
place where they can survive the storm?" He thought for a moment and realized
that they just wouldn't follow a human. "If only I were a goose, then I could
lead them," he said out loud. Then he had an idea.
He went into barn, got one of his own geese, and carried it in his arms as he
circled around behind the flock of wild geese. He then released it.
His goose flew through the flock and straight into the barn--and one by one the
other geese followed it to safety. He stood silently for a moment as the words
he had spoken a few minutes earlier replayed in his mind: "If only I were a
goose, then I could save them!"
Then he thought about what he had said to his wife earlier. "Why would God want
to be like us? That's ridiculous!" Suddenly it all made sense. That is what God
had done. We were like the geese, blind, lost, perishing. God had His Son become
like us so He could show us the way and save us.
As the winds and blinding snow died down, his soul became quiet and pondered
this wonderful thought. Suddenly he understood why Christ had come to earth.
Years of doubt and disbelief vanished like the passing storm. He fell to
his knees in the snow, and prayed his first prayer: "Thank You, God, for coming in human form to get me out of
the storm!"
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