Partners (27 page)

The sermon that morning made very clear that the coming of the Lord had been for the definite purpose of taking sin upon His sinless Self, that those who accepted Him as their personal Savior might go free from the burden and penalty of their sins.

"I don't think I ever quite understood it when I was a boy," said Rand thoughtfully, as after a pleasant greeting from the young minister they started back to their apartment. "Most of the ministers I ever heard left it all so vague and kind of indefinite that it seemed only a form that one must go through, like making out papers for taxes or something of that sort. It never entered my head that I hadn't done everything I ought to when I stood up before people and 'joined the Church'! I thought that was all that was required, and I had sort of bought a ticket to heaven. But now I see that there was to be a definite decision of your very innermost soul to accept what Christ has done for you, or His work is of no effect for you personally. I'm glad we went to church this morning. That wasn't a Santa Claus sermon, it was a Christ message."

"Yes," said Dale, "it was very clear. I feel as if this was a very happy Christmas, and a wonderful beginning for our life together. A real Christmas beginning."

They had a pleasant dinner down at the restaurant and then hurried back to the apartment, finding the baby just wakened from a nice long sleep and smiling at their coming. That was a definite thing now, that he could really smile and show actual dimples.

Rand, still thoughtful, stood looking down at him.

"Well, now, boy," he said, "it's about time you and I had a talk. Could I hold him in my lap, Dale, or would that be too much of an experiment?"

"Why, of course you can hold him," said Dale, coming smiling to his assistance. "Here, let me fix him in your arms!"

She gathered him up with a little blue blanket about him, and Rand sat down and held the little fellow carefully, as if he were china and might break.

The baby lay there and stared up at him, fixedly, earnestly, and then suddenly broke into a real, happy smile.

"Why, he likes me, Dale! Just look at that. He almost acts as if he knew me!"

"Yes, of course," said Dale happily. "Why wouldn't he know you? See! He looks as if he was remembering back to that time in the Beck front hall when his overcoat came off beside a bank of snow and you picked him up and carried him to comfort. Certainly he remembers you! He's getting it across to himself that you are the head of this little family he's come to live with, and he likes it."

And then suddenly Rand bent his head and touched his lips lightly to the little forehead.

"Yes!" he said, and there was a sound of tears in his voice and a look like moisture in his eyes. So much so that Dale stooped over and kissed her man on the forehead and then brushed her lips lightly over the baby's hand.

"And now, boy," said Rand soberly when he could get the huskiness out of his voice, "I've got something to tell you. It's a story, a really truly story. Will you listen to me?"

"A-h-h-h-g-g-g-o-o-o!" said the baby quite distinctly.

Dale laughed softly and turned away to hide the quick happy tears that had sprung to her own eyes.

"That's right!" said Rand. "I'm glad to know you're listening, son. Now, this story, son, that I'm going to tell you is very important. It's about the most important thing in this life, and I want you to remember it. I'm going to tell you again and again, over and over, but this is the first time, and it's the beginning of it all. Now, listen! Long ago there was a baby born. A Christmas baby! His name was Jesus, and He was born in a manger, where the cows eat their hay, because there wasn't any palace or mansion ready for Him, just a manger! And God set a big bright star over the stable where the manger was, to let the world know God's Son was born. It was a star something like that one up there on the wall. See? And everybody wondered about the star that night. God had told the world He was going to send His Son sometime, but nobody thought He would be born in a stable with just a manger for His crib, so they didn't recognize Him. Not even when that great big oversize star came out to show where He was, they didn't know. They just wondered.

"Only there were some wise men who had read about the baby that was coming someday, and the star that was coming to point the way. And away off in a desert somewhere they saw the star and followed it and finally found the little baby and worshipped Him. They prayed to Him. Sometime, pretty soon when you can talk, we'll teach you how to pray to Him, too. You have a great deal to thank Him for when you get old enough to understand, and we're going to teach you all about it. But now, today, it's important for you to know about this baby that was born, and about the wise men who came on camels to see Him, and about the shepherds on the hillside taking care of their little woolly lambs. You see some of the shepherds had heard there was a baby coming, and one night when they sat by the fire on the hillside under the starlight, with little stars sprinkled all around the big sky, they saw a great big light, and while they were wondering a bright angel came stepping down gold stairs in the sky, and they were very much afraid, but the angel told them not to be afraid for he was bringing some happy news for everybody, because Jesus, the Savior, the little Christ, was born right then that night, over in the little town of Bethlehem, and if they wanted to see Him they could go right over there now and they would find Him laying in a manger, in a stable, with just little plain clothes on, the kind all babies wear. Just like the little clothes Mommy Dale put on you. And then all of a sudden there were a whole lot of angels stepping down the sky, singing out just the way those pretty bells sing out, 'Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will to men!' You must ask Mommy to teach you that someday so you can say it for me. Perhaps not next Christmas, but very likely the next. And so when the angels went away the shepherds began to talk. They said, 'C'mon, fellas, let's go over there and see if this thing that God has sent us word about has really happened.' So they went, and they found it all true. There was the little Jesus lying in a manger in the nice soft straw, and there was His Mommy Mary right beside Him, just like your Mommy Dale is right here beside us now, and there was Joseph waiting on them and taking care of them. And so those shepherds were so happy their little Christ, King Jesus had really come at last that they kneeled down and worshipped Him. And oh, how they loved Him! They wished they had a lot of nice presents to bring Him, but they didn't have anything to bring, so they gave Him their own selves, and then because they couldn't do anything else for Him they went out back to the pasture and their sheep, but they told everybody they met about the Christ having been born. And that's what you and I and everybody who knows and loves the little Lord Jesus must do. We must go out and tell everybody we meet that the Christ Savior has come, and why He came, because we all have sinned. He came to be a sacrifice for our sins, so that everybody could be forgiven who would believe on Him.

"And now, son, we'll just say a little verse together, you and I and Mommy Dale, too, if she wants to. It is called John 3:16. I learned it this morning, and so can you if you try. We'll say it three times, and then we'll take a walk across the room and look at the pretty balls on the tree and hear the bells ring 'Glory,' and then it will be time for your bottle. Now, say it: 'For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.'"

The baby blinked, gave a faint smile, and gurgled sweetly. Dale wondered if the angels were listening to this extraordinary talk to a tiny child. Could it be possible that there was anything in what George had said, that you couldn't begin too young? Certainly a wee baby like that could not understand, and yet, he was gathering a vocabulary. Even scientists admitted that very young children began at once to store up words in their minds. Well, it was a sweet thing to hear George talk to the baby. Of course it could do no harm, and might perhaps lay a foundation, if only with the name of Jesus, the word
Savior
.

They went to church again that night, for Sarah in view of the holiday she was promised on the morrow was only too willing to stay quietly with the baby. And on the way home they encountered more than one group of carolers singing in the streets. When they were at last getting to their rest they heard sweet voices singing down below their window: "Christ the Savior is born."

Then as the midnight hour struck, wild and sweet, the bells began to repeat the old sweet carol:

 

When marshalled on the nightly plain,

The glittering host bestud the sky,

One star alone of all the train,

Can fix the sinner's wandering eye.

Hark! Hark! To God the chorus breaks

For every host, from every gem;

But one alone the Savior 'speaks--

It is the star of Bethlehem.

 

Dale as she drifted off to sleep wondered if there ever had been such a dear Christmas Eve as this, and then began remembering back to the days when she was a little girl and stars and trees and lovely dolls and other presents bulked large in her little-girl mind and her mother's kiss was sweet on her lips, her father's loving voice in her ears. Yes, there had been dear Christmases before. But perhaps it was that there had been a long interval of darkness and sadness, and great loneliness, and now life seemed to have blended the sweet old things with the new, and Christmas was still Christmas, dear and sweet, and brighter than any other day of the year, yet with a meaning for eternity that other days did not have, and never could have, perhaps, unless it was Easter.

Then suddenly Rand, whom she had thought asleep, spoke out of the darkness: "Dale are you asleep?"

"Oh, no, just dreaming of the marvelous day. What is it?"

"Dale, did you notice the little poem in the sermon tonight?"

"Yes, wasn't it lovely? I wanted to write it down but didn't have a pencil. I wonder if we could remember it."

"Well, I know the last two lines," said Rand. "I remembered them because they seemed to fit my case. 'I only know the manger-child has brought new life to me.' "

"Oh," said Dale. "Wait! I thought I'd remember that first line. I tried to memorize it as he repeated it. 'I know not how--' it began. Yes, that's it.

 

'I know not how that Bethlehem's Babe

Could in the Godhead be;

I only know the manger-child

Has brought new life to me.' "

 

"That's it, Dale. I'm glad you remembered it. I somehow wanted to go on record with you tonight, our first Christmas Eve together, that the manger-child really
has
brought new life to me. And I guess that is why our little fellow was sent to us. To bring me all the way to God, and help me to understand."

"Oh, George, dear, isn't He wonderful?" said Dale softly, reaching over and slipping her hand into his.

"And now," said Rand after another few minutes, "what are we going to call that kid? We've got to have a name for the adoption papers next week, you know. It seems as if it ought to be something significant. Don't you think so?"

"Oh, yes!" she breathed. "It seems as if there isn't any name good enough for him!"

"Well, what would you think of Ransom? It means 'redeemed,' you know. The only trouble is, it's my redemption, not his."

"Oh, but you're mistaken," cried Dale. "It would mean the baby's redemption, too. Don't you see? For suppose he had lain in Mrs. Beck's hall till she called the police, or had been sent to a home where they didn't know the Lord, and they let him grow up wild without knowing God. Suppose he had never found anybody who loved him or knew the Lord? It was the baby's redemption, for now as long as the Lord lets him stay with us, he'll be taught every day about Him. We'll have to study the Bible and help him to grow up knowing the truth. And it will be in commemoration of the night he was saved, from physical death, and spiritual, too."

"Yes," said Rand. "I thought of that, too, only I didn't know how to say it. I only wish we knew if the little white mother in the cemetery knew God."

"Well, we've nothing to do with that of course. God knows, and someday He will tell us and explain it all, how everything happened, and we'll be glad that it brought redemption and a new life to us as well as to the little beloved child. Yes, I like the name Ransom. It goes well with ours, too. Ransom Rand! That sounds very good. And when he goes to school they'll call him Rannie."

"Yes," said Rand. "Until he gets to high school, and then they'll call him 'Rand' of course and won't know what it's all about. But we'll be sure that he understands, himself, that his name means redemption, and the redemption of more than one! We'll try to teach him that he owes it to the One who was born on Christmas Day to save him, that he should dedicate his life to saving others. He can write like his foster father, or he can be in business as his play mother was, or he can do any of the things that God puts in the way of doing, but he must always remember that first and before everything else he must always be telling others about the wonderful Savior, the baby Jesus, who was born to redeem him and others. He must always bear about in his mind the real meaning of his name, Ransom. Redemption! Isn't that good, Dale?"

"Yes, that is good!" said Dale. "There couldn't be a better name for the little boy he is. Oh, George, it is so wonderful that you who haven't been sure about your salvation till just these last few days, should know how to talk this way. I suppose it's because you're a writer and know how to say things."

"Think again, sweetheart! I had a mother who knew God well, and a father who, I believe, really loved Him, and they talked before me. I had a background of that sort. I don't remember how early they began to talk before me. My trouble was that I liked the world and wouldn't give in till God gave me trouble and disappointment for teachers. But I guess it doesn't just have to be that way. It's because we choose the way of trouble ourselves rather than to give up our own way."