Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / December 2, 2018 | Discover The Wonder - Davey's Night

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December 2, 2018 | Discover The Wonder - Davey's Night · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Hello?
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_01: Shalom?
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: I see that my talk has been called Davy's Night.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_01: Of course I'm not Davy anymore.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_01: That was my childhood name.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_01: Now everyone just calls me David, David.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_01: I'm uh, just so you know me a little better, I'm uh I have a little bakery in Bethlehem.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: I have a wood oven, and uh I make great pastry.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_01: I make uh perfect pita that's uh that's uh fluffy and blistered.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_01: And and best of all, I make this Shabbat bread, this kabuna, that uh uh bakes overnight slowly and is uh soft on the inside and crisp on the outside.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_01: And as you can see, I sample, uh freely sample my own work.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_01: So those of us um who like to eat suffer our share of persecution.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_01: I was buying a robe in Ov's shop and he was measuring my waist, and he said, You know, David, he said, a sycamore tree with uh this size trunk would be at least 30 feet tall.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: But I I don't I I don't care.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_01: My my father, my Ava, my uh my my papa uh always used to say, eat up, Davy.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_01: You never know the Messiah might come tomorrow.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_01: I miss my Papa.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_01: I uh I always miss him this time of year.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um it's not as though we're unacquainted with death.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, we we live shorter lives than you do uh in your day, but uh death always seems to come too too soon or too late.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_01: And in our family, it was always too too early.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_01: My my mom died when I was quite young, so I never knew her like my older brother Jethro did.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um after she died, we lived in a small house.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_01: My papa let me uh come sleep with him in bed, and night after night I would fall asleep with his big arm over me, and I I I felt protected, I felt warm.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: But when I was eight, uh Abba uh Papa remarried and I lost my place uh in in the bed.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_01: I I missed I missed his arm.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_01: My stepmother uh never felt like a mother to me.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not saying it was her fault, it's just the way it was.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_01: My big brother Jethro, he was years older than I was.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: He never had much time for his baby brother, but he was already by that time.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_01: He was already big and strong and looking really like uh my papa, and uh and and he didn't he didn't need anything, and and but I was small, and so Papa spent time with me.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_01: He allowed me to, he called me his helper, and I would follow him around on the farm walking behind him, and I would watch him.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_01: He was so large, so big, his neck and his shoulders and his arms so thick, and his hands hung loosely down from his uh tunic, almost like uh great tools hanging on the wall of a shed.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_01: And and he was so strong.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_01: But but he uh but he wasn't only solemn.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_01: He had uh he had this smile, he had a crooked smile.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_01: He had a funny sort of face, and when he smiled, it was on a slant, and his head was crooked.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: And and sometimes when we were in the crush of a crowd, and he would feel my grip and could tell I was afraid, or would catch sight of me looking up to find his face in the market or up in the temple in Jerusalem when when people were all around.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_01: He would cock his head at me and roll his eyes and smile that crooked smile, and and everything would settle down inside of me.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_01: So uh we had a good life, uh, and then well, he got sick.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_01: I should tell you that he wasn't a perfect papa.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_01: He he had a temper.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_01: I think I'll tell you about the the the one time especially that he lost his temper at me.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_01: One morning I was outside and uh Jethro, my brother Bur Jethro said, Do you did you know it was Papa's birthday today?
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_01: And and I said, I didn't.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_01: And that was that.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_01: But I'd made, I decided that I was going to get my Abba a gift that day, but I had no money, of course.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_01: But I knew there was a place where I could probably earn some coins at the other end of Bethlehem.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_01: There was an inn, and uh the innkeeper had a stable.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_01: It it wasn't in the inn, of course, it was just over the hillside.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_01: It was in a large cave where he kept his guests' animals and his own, and it got very bad in there, as you can imagine, till even the animals didn't want to go go in the cave.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_01: And at the price he was paying at the salary, no one, he had a hard time getting anyone to work there, but a nine-year-old boy.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_01: I was nine at that point, um, could perhaps do that.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_01: So, yes, he he offered me the job when I asked.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_01: I ran down to the other end of town, got the shovel, went to the cave, and it was especially bad that day.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_01: And it took me until late afternoon to shovel out the cave.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_01: But when I was all done, I had a few coins in my hand, and I ran up to the market.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_01: I knew exactly what I wanted.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_01: I knew exactly what Papa liked.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_01: Because when we would go to the market together, I would always see Papa when we passed Lena's shop, the one with the sweets, Papa had a sweet tooth.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: I would see him look at the bars there where they were full of honey and dates and nuts and pressed into a bar.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_01: And I would see Papa look at those, and then we would walk on.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_01: And I knew exactly what to get him.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_01: And I went in, and sure enough, there was one big bar left.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: It was, it was, I worshipped it.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: It was like having right there uh uh on the on her shelf.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: She said to me, uh, Davey, are you just looking?
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_01: I said, No, it's my papa's birthday.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_01: I want that.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_01: And she wrapped it for me and uh I put it inside my tunic.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_01: It was already getting late.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_01: It was already getting dark.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_01: I knew uh it was later than it should be, and so I ran home.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_01: I came over the top of the hill and then saw right away my papa in the middle of the road, and I could see that he was very angry.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_01: His face was as red as a pomegranate, the veins were popping out of his neck, and I was afraid.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_01: Now he he was angry at me, and he yelled out, Where have you been?
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_01: He said, We've waited an hour supper for you.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_01: And when I got close, he grabbed me roughly and he shook me, and I began to cry, and he said, Where were you?
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_01: And all I could blubber was, I wanted to get you a a present.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_01: And and I reached in and I pulled out the sweet bar, but the honey had melted and it was in the shape of a rainbow.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_01: And and and and I said, This is, I got this for you.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: And he fell silent and took a deep breath, and suddenly the his temper melted away, and he pulled me close and he hugged me so tight I could barely breathe for a long time and cleared his throat again and again, and then in a hoarse voice, he said, Thank you, Davy.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_01: That night, we went into supper then, but that night some of the neighbors came over, and as they were sitting there, one of them pointed up at the ledge and said, What is there's a sweet bar up there in the shape of a rainbow.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_01: What's that?
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_01: And my papa said, That's a birthday present from my son Davy there.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_01: He looked across the room and smiled that crooked smile at me.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: And I was happy.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_01: But then he got sick.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_01: I hate to remember those days.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: Many people got sick.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_01: Many got better.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_01: Well, some got better.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_01: Others died.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_01: My papa didn't get better.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_01: He just lay there, day after day, pale.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_01: Still, I would wipe his forehead or maybe hold his hand.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_01: I was going to bed one night and he motioned me over.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_01: I knelt by his bed and he whispered, um, baby, um I'm gonna go.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_01: I'm ready to go, but I'm not ready to leave.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not ready to leave you.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_01: I wanted to see you grow up to be brave and strong.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not ready to leave Bethlehem, he said, because you know, Davy.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_01: He said, I'd heard this tone so many times before.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_01: He said, You know, Davy, the prophet Micah.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: Says that one day soon the Messiah will come.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_01: I wished I would want to be here when that happened.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_01: Of course I knew.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_01: How many times had he made us recite with him those words, those famous words, Bethlehem, though you are the smallest of the villages of Judah, yet out of you will come one who will be the ruler of my people, Israel, whose beginnings are from ancient days, from everlasting.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_01: I knew those words.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_01: When I crawled into bed that night, I prayed so very hard to God that my papa would not leave.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_00: But when I woke up the next morning he was gone.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_01: That's what we do in our day.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: We have the strips of cloth as the cloth around him, around his chest, the cloth around each arm, cloth around each leg, strips of cloth, and his face as pale as the cloth which held the spices in against his body.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_01: And then they closed up the grave and we walked away, and that was the image I walked away with.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_01: I confess I um I did not do well after my father's death.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_01: Something died inside of me.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_01: I cried for a while and then the tears ran out, and then I stopped crying and maybe stopped caring.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_01: I wanted to blame someone.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_01: I was angry, but I couldn't get angry at anyone.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes, sometimes in the market, I would think I saw him.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_01: I would, or imagine it perhaps, hope to see his face, that face that looked like it was hewn out of cedar, long and bony, with that jawbone that Samson would have envied.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_01: And and I would think I saw him out of the corner of my eye, and I would turn and look, and and uh he would be gone.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_01: I said terrible things to my friends until I had no more friends.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_01: I got into fights, not caring whether I won or lost.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_01: I was even angry at Jethro because Jethro could leave.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_01: Jethro was old enough, you see, and really uh looked a lot like my father then, and he left home and he joined the shepherds of all things.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: I know that uh to be a shepherd is a romantic thing for you today.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_01: In our day, uh being a sheep herder is just one small step above being a leper, and a large step below being a beggar for a number of reasons, I suppose.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_01: So one is that shepherds are always filthy, and Hebrews, if you know us, we believe in washing.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_01: We're all about washing and staying clean, and shepherds, they didn't have an opportunity to bathe, I suppose, so they couldn't go to the temple.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_01: And uh he joined the shepherds, and I was angry at him and jealous at the same time.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_01: I wish that I could have been a shepherd too, or anything.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_01: And I didn't let anyone touch me.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_01: After a while, my stepmother stopped trying.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: And then came uh the worst of nights, which turned into the best of nights.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_01: I came home, I'd gotten in a bad fight that night, and my eye was uh purple.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: My stepmother yelled at me, and I went to bed, and as I often, I suppose, did, I imagined as I lay down, I imagined my father coming into bed and sliding there beside me and putting his great arm over me.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_01: I imagined that, and then I would imagine looking at him and seeing his face break into that crooked grin.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_01: Only this night, uh, as I imagined his face, I couldn't see his face.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_01: Has that ever happened to you?
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: I tried to see his face and I couldn't see his face, and I screwed up my mind or my eyes, and I tried again and I couldn't, and I became frantic, I became panicked.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_01: I felt somehow I was convinced that if I couldn't see it tonight, that I would never see him again, that I would lose him forever.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I kept trying until I was sweaty.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_01: For hours I felt like I was trying, and I became crazy.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_01: I know I wasn't thinking clearly.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_01: And then it struck me there was one thing I could do.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_01: I could go find Jethro, and I could ask Jethro what Papa looked like, and he would tell me, and then everything would be fine.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_01: And I and I and I crept out of bed so as not to awaken my stepmother, and I crawled across the floor and slipped out the door, and and there, wow, it was the middle of the night, and stars were so thick and heavy, it looked as though if they fell on the earth, it would crush the earth.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: And the earth was quiet and lonely except for these scary patches of shadow trees where wild beasts or men might be lurking.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: I'd never, as a 12-year-old, I was 12, I would never been out that late at night before.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: I knew it was crazy.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: I but I had to go on.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_01: I couldn't go back.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_01: And with my knees turning to water, I ran, I ran, and when I went through the shadows, I ran faster.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_01: I had been to see my brother, I had seen where they liked to keep their flocks on the hillside outside Bethlehem.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_01: I'd seen those places, and I would look until I found them, and I ran.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_01: And and it seemed as though the stars kept coming closer to Earth until they sat on top of the hills, and even the ground over which I ran seemed to be a living beast that was breathing silently, waiting for something.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_01: And once as I ran, I know I my mind was playing tricks on me.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_01: I thought I heard sound, voices, many voices, even singing in the air, but when I stopped, there was nothing.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_01: And on I ran until finally, finally I came over a hill, and there I looked down, and there were dark dots all over the valley, and I knew it was the great flock that my brother and his friends, uh Benay and Kish and the others that they watched over.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_01: It took a number of shepherds to watch over all those sheep.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_01: And I ran down the hill, and though it was the middle of the night, I didn't care.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_01: I yelled out, Jethro, Jethro.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: And I was surprised, no one even moved, and I called it out again, and it was still down there, no one moving.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_01: I thought, this is this is impossible.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_01: There have to be.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_01: Shepherds would not leave their sheep alone out in the night with so many wild animals and thieves.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_01: And I yelled, and and there wasn't anyone, and then suddenly I stopped so fast I nearly fell over because there was, there was, there was one, there was one person standing so still a little away from the fire, I had thought it was a tree.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_01: But I saw his eyes looking out from the thick cowl over his head.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_01: I saw his eyes watching me.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_01: And then he spoke.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_01: He said, Shalom.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_01: How are you?
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_01: In a pleasant voice, how are you?
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_01: He said, but his voice was strange.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_01: It wasn't a shepherd's voice.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know how to describe it.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: It wasn't a voice I understood.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_01: It wasn't a voice filled with dirt and blood.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_01: It was a voice as pure as a flute, maybe, or a bassoon, but it said, How are you?
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_01: And and I said, Oh, okay, a little cold.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_01: And he said, Well, then come and join me under my cloak.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: And he lifted the side of his cloak like a great wing, and I found myself going, I who had not touched anyone willingly in years, going under his cloak and feeling his warmth and his protection, feeling unafraid.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_01: But where are the others?
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_01: I said.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, they're gone to Bethlehem, he said.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_01: I said, uh in the middle of the night, leaving their flocks?
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_01: Why?
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_01: He said, Well, somebody important is having a birthday today and they wanted to go celebrate.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_01: And I blurted out, not thinking, well, they shouldn't have left their sheep alone.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_01: One shepherd is not enough to guard the sheep.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_01: And he laughed silently, and he said, I believe I am equal to protecting the sheep.
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, But against robbers, I said, against wild beasts.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_01: And he said, I think I am able to protect the flock against beasts and strangers.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: I said, Have you done fighting?
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_01: He said, I suppose I have.
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_01: And now I was interested.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_01: I said, have you fought bears and lions?
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_01: And he hesitated for a while and then he said, I have fought the devil and his angels.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_01: I looked at him, but he was looking far away.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_01: I said, Are you a soldier?
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_01: What's your name?
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_01: You're not a shepherd.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_01: He said, No.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_01: I am not a shepherd.
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_01: I am.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: I am, I guess, a soldier, and my name is Ariel.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_01: And at that he shook himself and he looked at me and he said, But what's your name?
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_01: Boy.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_01: I said, Davy.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_01: David.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_01: He said, That's a good name for a boy who likes sheep.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_01: He said, But what are you doing out at this time of night?
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_01: I said, I'm looking for Jethro.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_01: And then something in me broke.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_01: And I told him everything.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_01: I told him about my dad, my papa, my Abba and me, and how suddenly he had died and left me alone.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_01: And it seemed he would never, ever, I would never see him again.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: And tonight, when my life was terrible, I couldn't even see his face.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_01: And I had come to talk to Jethro and see if he could tell me again what my papa looked like.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_01: And the stranger listened when I was done and kept listening, it seemed, and then gently said to me, What you need to do, my boy, is you need to go back to Bethlehem.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_01: I said, Why?
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_01: He said, for one thing, that's where your brother Jethro is.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_01: And for another, he said, there's somebody important who's having a birthday today.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_01: And he's the most important one for you to see.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_01: For when you see him, you'll understand that death and darkness are not the end.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_01: That there's something that comes after that.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_01: That even your father, when he died, and you were saying, our father is dead, there were angels in heaven saying, He is being born.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_01: And that, my son, is glory to God and the highest, and peace to men on earth.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, he said, that's what you need.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_01: You need to go to Bethlehem.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_01: I said, But how will I find them?
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: All I can tell you, he said, is what they were told, that a great blessing has come upon the whole earth, a great joy today, even to shepherds.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_01: That today in the city of David a Savior has been born who is Christ the Lord.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_01: And this is the sign that you'll know him.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_01: A babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_01: A manger?
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_01: I said, I think I know that manger.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_01: I've cleaned that cave.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_01: And he said, Well then go, get going.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_01: Lifted up the edge of his cloak like great wings closing in the wind, and I felt the wind around me then.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_01: I said, Won't you go with me?
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_01: He said, No, I'm to stay here and guard the sheep.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_01: And so I stepped up the hill, but feeling fear, I turned back to see him, but he was gone, or I couldn't see him, or I saw something I imagined that could be him, but might not be.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: But I thought, but Ariel can see me, the soldier who fears neither devil nor lion.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_01: And my heart became brave.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I ran on up the hill and into the shadow, and I ran and I fell, and I got up and I ran again.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_01: And then when my legs were turning to water, I came across the road into Bethlehem and knew where I was and where I was going.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_01: And as I came over the hillside, finding the cave, I saw light, a glow coming from the mouth of the cave.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_01: I stepped in and I saw goats and sheep and a donkey and a cow and the light coming from one corner of the cave.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_01: And as I approached, the first person I saw was a pretty girl, not much older than I was.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_01: Her back against the rock of the cave wall, looking so exhausted, but her eyes wide open, she was staring at uh at a group of men, my brother, the shepherds, kneeling on the straw, crouching before a manger.
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_01: And it appeared to me that in the manger was a newborn, a baby.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_01: Was this, was this the important person who was having a baby?
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_01: Could this be the Messiah, the Lord that my papa had been waiting for?
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_01: I took another step forward and then froze.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_01: For was the baby, was the baby dead?
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_01: For it was wrapped up like a corpse.
• 27:14
  SPEAKER_01: It was wrapped up with claws, each arm, little arm wrapped up with strips of cloth, each leg, its little body wrapped up, looked like, looking like uh like my father.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_01: It had never struck me before that we we treat our dead and our newborns the same way, we wrap them the same way.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_01: And as I looked at this baby looking still, eyes closed, looking even dead, my eyes filled with tears.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: And then looking at that face through the prism of my tears, that face swam and became my fa, my papa's face, lying there pale and still and cold and dead, but with strips of cloth all over him.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I saw his face, a face that I wondered if I could ever see again, and I knew what he looked like again, and I imagined his smile, and at that moment, as my tears cleared, the sun rose behind me over the horizon, and a ray of light came in the cave and lit on the face of the baby, and the baby's eyes opened, and his face came alive, and his eyes looked to one side and the other, and then it seemed looked up at me, and I imagined that he smiled a little crooked smile at me.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_01: I blur, I blurted out out loud.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_01: He smiled at me, and Jethro, surprised to hear my voice, turned and said, No, Davy, he's he's just burping.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_01: But it didn't matter, I didn't mind because I had seen my father's face again, and I knew that in the same way that the sun had risen on this baby wrapped in those claws.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_01: That one morning after his death, my papa wrapped in those claws and had the ray of heaven's sunlight hit his face, and his eyes had opened, and he had stirred and smiled at someone, and I stared at this baby, this Messiah, the Lord, and I fell to my knees beside the shepherds and I adored him too.
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_01: Now you see why I I said that it began as the worst of nights but ended as as the best of nights.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_01: I still miss my papa first time of year.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_01: His face, his his arm, his um smile.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_01: But but I know something now.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_01: I know that when the darkness of death gives way to the sunrise that there is life forever.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I am no longer alone on this earth, I know that.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_01: As I was kneeling there, uh my big big brother, Jethro, slipped his great arm around me.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_01: And he said, David.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_00: And I was too.