It's still the greatest story ever told

I love to read, and have a special fondness for fiction. Some scoff at the idea of reading novels and consider it a waste of time, yet Jesus told a lot of stories, so I don't think He'd knock reading a good story.

  And yet, no one can touch the Christmas story. There's a song the Gaither Vocal Band recorded on their first Christmas CD that is called It's Still the Greatest Story Ever Told. And of all of the stories ever written and told, there is none greater. No other author comes close, and no other author would have come up with such a crazy plan. We in our finite minds can think about it, and be amazed and feel wonder, but I don't think we'll truly get it until we step into Heaven and see what Jesus left for us. Until we see and look on the holiness and majesty of God.

  But we should still think on it, even if we can't fully appreciate it here.

The God of eternity made man and breathed into man a living soul,something no other living thing has.

Then He put something in him called choice. He didn't make robots, but living beings that would choose to serve Him or not. And looking down through time, He saw that most of us wouldn't serve Him. Yet He still made us, and still gave us the ability to choose Him or scorn and refuse Him.

All man had to do was to not eat of one tree, and yet they did that. God knew they would. He knew that one act would bring all sorts of evil and disease. Everything bad can be traced to that one act: cancer, child molestation, abuse, murder.... God saw it all, and yet created us and gave us the ability to choose.

 And after man sinned, God promised a Savior. Even then, He had a plan. And many, many years later, He put it into play.

  We'd have done it differently. Imagine sending your only Son as a baby into the same world that had been mostly rejecting you for so many years. He knew what was coming, and still He did it. And then the way He did it.

 A pregnant virgin? Who would believe that? And to have Him be born in a stable, laid in a manger, instead of the palace and kingly bed that He deserved.

 And then He sent a multitude of angels to announce the birth to........ shepherds? Dirty, smelly, lowly shepherds.

 To let the Son of God be raised by a carpenter and a young woman, to step back and let humans take care of God in man.

  Then 33 years later, to allow evil men to beat, mock, and crucify His only Son. Surely it could have been done another way.

 Yet the only way was blood from a sinless person, and Jesus was the only sinless One.

  God became Man in a very unorthodox way, died and rose again so He could live in our hearts and we could go to live with Him some day. It is a pretty wild tale. Not at all like we would have written the story, but that is the way He did it.

 And of all the stories that have ever been told, or will ever be told, it is still the greatest story. The greatest story ever told.

A woman and an angel, a promise and a song.
A word too grand for any mind to hold.
A tax law and a journey, a stable and some straw.
These tell the greatest story ever told.

Oh sing glory in the highest, he is come our great messiah.
Come bow before this awesome mystery.
Mighty God and fragile baby, here a lowly manger holds.
And it's still the greatest story ever told.

A hillside and some shepherds, a blaze of blinding light.
Angels singing carols in the cold.
Eternal revelation to men as dull as stone.
The glorious, greatest story ever told.

Oh sing glory in the highest, he is come our great messiah.
Come bow before this awesome mystery.
Mighty God and fragile baby, here a lowly manger holds.
And it's still the greatest story ever told.

Oh sing glory in the highest, he is come our great messiah.
Come bow before this awesome mystery.
Mighty God and fragile baby, here a lowly manger holds.
And it's still the greatest story ever told.

And it's still the greatest story ever told.