Holiday Gifts & Gift Baskets Blog

Archive for February, 2008

Many years ago a young man came from another town to make his home in the village of Nazareth. The village was in a country called Galilee. The man's name was Joseph. Joseph was very helpful to the people of Galilee. He made wooden plow points with which they could plow their wheat fields. He carved wooden troughs which held water for the donkeys and the oxen. He made bowls for food and little barrels for milk and grape juice.

Joseph worked at a bench along the street. He watched the people as they walked by. Fishermen went past him on their way to the sea. Farmers walked by with their work animals. Children ran races and played games near his bench.

Many women and girls walked along the street, too. The town's well was at the end of the street and the women went there after water.

Joseph noticed one young girl more than the others. Her name was Mary. She was a very beautiful girl.

"But her kindness and her gentle ways make her even more beautiful," thought the carpenter.

Little goats and lambs came running as Mary walked along the street. Sometimes she patted their heads. Sometimes she gave one a bite of grass or a scrap of bread.

The birds were not afraid of Mary.

Doves flew about her head. Little singing birds chirped as she walked by.

The little children loved Mary, too. She was so pretty and kind and smiling. If a small boy stubbed his toe and fell down, she hurried to help him up.

If a little girl broke her doll, Mary took time to help mend the toy.

"What a lovely maiden!" thought Joseph. "She will be a good wife and mother!"

Mary had noticed the carpenter, too. "He has a kind face and gentle manners," she thought. "His work is careful.

He is good to old people and beggars."

One day Joseph came to see Mary's mother, who was a widow. He told her that he would like to marry her daughter.

Mary's mother was pleased.

"The young carpenter comes from a good and noble family," she told Mary. "He is a relative of the great King David who lived long ago."

Mary was happy. She was glad to know about the noble people in Joseph's family.

"But Joseph is noble, too," she said. "He is a kind, good man. I am glad he wishes to marry me!"

Before long there was a great wedding party in the town. Mary's mother and her relatives planned the party. It was the engagement party for Mary and Joseph. All of Mary's relatives came. There was a feast. Most of the relatives were pleased with Joseph.

Not long after this a strange thing happened to Joseph. While he was asleep, an angel came to him.

"I am the angel of the Lord," said the visitor. "You have done well to choose Mary for your wife."

"Mary is a dear and gentle maiden," answered the carpenter. "The Lord has been good to me."

The angel said, "A greater thing will happen. Mary's baby will be a son. He will grow into a holy king who will save the world. You will name him 'Jesus Emmanuel'."

"That name means 'God is with us,' " said the carpenter. The angel nodded his head. Then he disappeared.

Joseph awakened and sat up. "A heavenly visitor has been here!" he thought. He knelt and made a prayer of thanks.

He thought of stories which he had heard all his life, and which had come down through the years.

"Long ago the Lord promised King David a great thing. He promised that a lovely maiden should be given a gift of a baby boy. The maiden would be married to a man in David's own family. And the baby would become the Savior of the world."

Again Joseph bowed his head and made a prayer of thanks.

"I am only a poor carpenter," he said to himself. "Mary is just a poor girl. Can it be that the Lord has chosen us to keep his wonderful promise?"

The baby gift that they spoke of would soon be a story told for generations to come.

Once there was a young man named Kowashi, who lived with his old mother in a small Japanese village at the foot of the mountain. They were happy, respectable people and lived their lives in the simple, good way.

There was just one thing the young man used to wonder about. His mother used to be a gentle, sweet little woman. But when she got to be about eighty years old, he began to notice that she had long, sharp, pointed teeth. She used to eat her fish, tail, eyes, and all; she even seemed to enjoy crunching up the raw bones.

One night a fish peddler of Kowashi's village was walking home through the mountain pass after . a day's work at the market. He had not sold all his fish that day. And those left over were in the fishing gift basket which he carried on a pole over his shoulder.

He was not afraid of night robbers, because it was a bright moonlit night and he could see every stick and stone in the path.

Suddenly he was set upon by a whole horde of cats. They smelled the fish in his basket and were determined to get it.

He fought them off with the long pole. And he fought so smartly that finally the cats gave up the fight. Then one of them said, "Go call Old Woman Kowashi."

"That's funny," the peddler said to himself, for young Kowashi and his mother were his neighbors in the village.

So the man quickly climbed into a pine tree, wondering what would happen next.

In the moonlight the man could see the path and all the cats and their shadows as plain as day.

Soon one of the cats said, "Here she comes." Another said, "Here comes Old Woman Kowashi."

The man looked. And what he saw was a big tough old gray cat coming through the pass.

"He won't give us the fish!" all the cats said together.

So the big gray cat climbed up into the fish peddler's tree. The peddler was lying stretched out along a branch. The cat crawled out along the same branch until she came close to him - eye to eye!

Inch by inch she came nearer. Each of her sharp claws looked six inches long.

What could he do?

Suddenly he remembered that he had his fish gaff with him. (A fish gaff is a heavy barbed hook with a wooden handle, used for hauling heavy fish into a boat.)

Quickly he grabbed the fish gaff and gave the big gray cat a whack on the head.

Just about then the sun peeked over the horizon, It was morning, and all the cats vanished instantly. One minute they were there, and the next minute they were gone - just like that.

The fish peddler climbed down from the tree and hurried home. And that morning he went and told young Kowashi the whole story.

The young man listened and nodded his head.

He was thinking about how his mother had changed, and how her teeth had gotten so pointed. And just this morning he had noticed a deep gash on her head.

Now he asked her how she had cut herself, and she glared at him with baleful eyes and snarled, baring her long pointed teeth.

So young Kowashi suddenly understood: a cat witch had taken his mother's place! Quickly he seized the witch, drew his long sword, and cut off her head at one stroke.

Then he looked down, and what lay at his feet was a bloody old gray cat.

Not long after this, Kowashi discovered that the wicked cat witch had killed his real mother and buried her in the garden.