One Solitary Life... Merry Christmas!

He was born in an obscure village, the child of a peasant woman.
He grew up in another obscure village, where
He worked in a carpenter shop until He was thirty.
Then for three years He was an itinerant preacher.

He never had a family or owned a home.
He never set foot inside a big city.
He never traveled two hundred miles from the place He was born.
He never wrote a book, or held an office.
He did none of the things that usually accompany greatness.

When He was still a young man, the tide of popular opinion turned against Him.
His friends deserted Him
He was turned over to His enemies, and went through the mockery of a trial.
He was nailed to a cross between two thieves.
While He was dying,
His executioners gambled for the only piece of property He had -- His coat.
When He was dead,
He was taken down and laid in a borrowed grave.

Two thousand years have come and gone, and today
He is the central figure for much of the human race.

All the Armies that ever marched and
all the Navies that ever sailed and
all the Parliaments that ever sat and
all the Kings that ever reigned,
Put Together,
Have not affected the life of man upon this Earth as powerfully as this
"One Solitary Life."

- Adapted from an essay by Dr. James Allan Francis