Each Christmas I look at the shelves in the store, to see just what they stock anymore.
Jesus gets smaller each year that I see, and this year I found something that just could not be.
I looked on each aisle humming a song, and looked and I looked but something was wrong.
I found there were ornaments to put on your tree, there was NASCAR and Snoopy and of course there's Mickey.
But I could not find Jesus. He was nowhere to be seen. He was not on aisle one, or two or fifteen.
I pushed the cart faster and made such a clatter, the front wheel was loose, but it just not did matter.
It looked like it had happened; Christ was nowhere to be found.
Not one box of Nativities; I had looked all around.
I ask the man in the little blue vest. Where are the Nativities that people loved best?"
He said in a low voice that I could not really hear. "I'm sorry we do not have them in stock for this year."
I ask him to repeat the words that he said. I could not believe as they rang in my head.
He spoke louder and louder with a bit of a gruff. "We have no Nativities, we don't order that stuff.
We have no small sets, we have nothing large. We don't even have the ones for your yard.
They never were ordered, they will not be here. There's nothing about Christ in my department this year."
I stood there in shock. The day had arrived. The Christ of Christmas had failed to survive.
The birth of our King was gone from the shelves and had finally, completely been replaced by elves.
I was taken aback and was rather shaken; the man with his little blue vest must be mistaken.
I as wandered the store in a daze with no joy, I found myself staring right at a toy.
On the end cap I saw it, much to my surprise; a toy set Nativity for kids under five.
It was the last nativity they sold at the store. There was only one left there would never be more.
It was a child's toy to teach of Christ's birth, how God sent His only son, the Savior of Earth.
It was the only thing left in the store to tell, of the true Christmas story that I knew so well.
The story that's been told again and again of the birth of Jesus the Savior of men.
Of Joseph and Mary and a baby's cry, of wise men and shepherds and a star in the sky.
Of no room at the inn, and His virgin birth, of the angels that sang of Good Tidings and Peace on Earth.
The day that I feared was here to behold, that the final nativity set would be sold.
So I grabbed at the box, it's the last one you know. I was sad that it was, but I could not let go.
As I went to check out there was the lady in blue, "This is the last Nativity", I asked if she knew.
She acted surprised, that the store where she worked, had removed Christ from Christmas, see... she was only a clerk.
I was so sad, and dejected as I went to depart when the clerk clearly whispered, "Jesus still lives, He lives in our heart."
