Decatur Daily Democrat, Volume 54, Number 302, Decatur, Adams County, 24 December 1956 — Page 2

PAGE TWO

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This could be the story of the Great Birth at Bethlehem as it might hate been seen through the eyes of two average citizens of the day. TT BEGAN in BuJebcm, at registration twne. King Herod 1 had ordered that aii should register, so my father and 1 had joined hundreds from (*ear and far on the trek to the City of David. The streets were noisy and crowded, but we were soon set* tied comfortably in the quarters father secured for us with a small bag of coins. Others were not so fortunate. Most of the accommodations had been taken earlier and that which was left commanded a price most of the travelers were unable to pay. «■ rife® US --- nnnlSw % * {Mi 1 n I 1 Bl J V&b&V Though tired from our long journey, the noise and excitement of my first trip away from home caused me to spend a rather sleepless night. The Innkeeper had Posted a “No Room’ 1 sign nn the door, yet fore, was an altpoN constant. rap fRJP »- . newly-arrived travelers seeking rooms, most of whom begged only for a place to stretch out and rest their road-weary bodies. The Innkeeper turned them all away, refusing to further cramp his already crowded guests. He almost forcibly closed the door on one insistent traveler who pleaded that he had a sick wife who must have shelter immediately. . • “I have my troubles, too, my friend,” was his caustic reply. Mil l\T/ WliWUi J I} LZha j " /J - •» ' There were all sorts of interesting sounds in the darkness; tlie weary plodding of newly-arrived travelers, the scurrying of a dog, the braying of an ass, and the sound of a child crying in the night. I walked to the window and then I saw the star. » It appeared suddenly, and was by far the most brilliant I had ever seen. So bright was its light that on the near hillside 1 could see a stable where a number of people were gathered; excited people, it seemed, because of the manner in which they > moved about and gestured to one another. It was much too far for me to hear the sound of their voices, but I promised myself that on the morrow I would visit the stable and discover the cause of the excitement.

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After the momjng meal, I excused myself from my father’s presence and started for the hillside. Nearing the stable, I Was met by a young shepherd. .. ir - “There was excitement here last night,” he said. J “Yes,” I replied, “I saw it from my window. happened?” . • ■ “A King was bom, in this very stable.” i “A King?” J i “A true King. The King of all men.” “How foolish. Everyone knows that Herod is the only king And, for a King to be bom in a stable. What manner of Kipg might ha be?” : ■ ' “The angels have proclaimed that He is the King of all men. I myself heard them.” He looked up to the sky. “And, I saw them, too.” | “And you saw this King?” * 4 - r “I looked upon Him with my own eyes and I gave Him one of my most precious treasures —a newborn lamb. Os course, He could not speak, but His mother thanked me profusely for it.” ♦ “Then you are the foolish one, shepherd boy. I would not waste my time to look upon a King of sheep and animals who would be bom in the cold dampness of a miserable stable, nor would I offer Him so much as a blade of grass. He be no King at all. Someone has deceived you.” I went away, telling myself that I did not believe the shepherd’s story, yet, strangely afraid to enter the stable to look upon the child. Were He truly a King, I would have been ten# fied in His presence. j o IWB PJHSnI K ii - * w W—=fl®S® ’ <V .<■' / 1 |h y/ F\l /W 14 ' I ' ll ~ 4 L< WO nU™i ® ; iqgji WUIWMvII AS? In the streets of the city, there was much whispering and gathering about. Moving from one group to another, I found that the excitement centered about the strange events that had taken place at the stable. I This I heard from the tongue of a venerable old man: “I looked upon Him as He lay there in the unkempt surroundings of that stable and it seemed to me that the very atmosphere seemed changed because of His presence. I say there is something exceptional about this child.” And another, lifting his arms towafd the sky, said in low voice, “Surely, this is the King promised to us long ago.” A promised King, born in a stable, I thought. HpW confusing; it leaves me puzzled. I And there in the center of the largest group of all, I saw the shepherd boy, eager listeners pressing about him. He had been tending his sheep on a hillside, he said, when angels appeared, telling him to go to Bethlehem, where he would find a newborn King laid in a manger. He had been terribly frightened, but the angel had cautioned him to fear not, but to go to the stable with joy in his heart. Leaving his sheep uutended, he bad come to Bethlehem. Other shepherds had come too, as well as three men in royal robes who had come from a far distant land; guided, they said, by the light of a bright star that had bathed the stable and its surroundings in shining brilliance. How I envied the shepherd boy at this moment —and chided myself for not having looked upon this King-child so that I too, might have a story to tell. After all, I had seen the stable and

THE DECATUR DAILY DEMOCRAT, DECATUR, INDIANA

the excited people from my window’, but vzhat coil us a story could I make from that? My father’s business had not kept him so occupied that he had not heard of the birth of the so-called ctiilu King. As we were preparing to leave the city for the long journey home, he asked if I had heard anything in the market place. When I told him the things I had seen that night and the talk I had heard on the streets, he said that we would visit the stable as it was on the route that led us out of the city. “We must see the birthplace of the King,” he said. It was indeed a simple shelter, little more than four walls. Through a hole in the roof the morfiing rays~bf the sun slanted downward, casting a bright halo of light on the stable’s only furniture; a crude manger where the child must have lain. Reflections from the sparse straw scattered there made it fTh ■—| —i-—--• ’ \ 1 ! » \ IT I I VS'* * RH ill Ir>1 r> ’ "i appear to be lined with shining wisps of gold. “So, this is the birthplace of a King,” my father said, in an unbelieving tone. “How uncomfortable for a King.” He walked stopping just outside the shaft of light that encircled the manger.' He reached out as if to catch the sunlight in bis hand and for a moment he stood there, motionless. Then he jerked his hand away, as if he had been burned by a torch. Curious, I stepped forward and extended my own hand, half expecting to be burned or to experience some form of shock, but the ray of light felt only warm and comforting. Again my father’extended his arm and this time he did not draw it back, but stood there his eyes resting unbelievingly on the manger. And then suddenly I saw the reason for his bewilderment, and impulsively I drew back. Here indeed was an illusion or a miracle! KV . y»l IH? jn mm! -- , "rfiiiTi The glittering light seemed to form an untouchable aura about the crude crib and though the hand could pierce that light and move back and forth, it cast not a single shadow upon the glowing manger,-nor even slightly dimmed the gold-like lustre of the wisps of straw scattered there. This was no earthly light, no simple ray from the sun. ’ We knelt there in the stillness of the stable, a man who was no longer cynical; a child who had discovered faith. For one brief moment it seemed that the most tender scene was repeated; die Cod-like Child, wrapped in swaddling clothes, slept peacefully in the manger while the tender and loving bands of His Mother hovered about Him. And in the distance, there sounded the voices of the angels repeating our Whispered words of praise, “Hail to the King —-A King has been born in Bethlehem!” '■ ■ . .. O _ ' ', .■ •

Former Berne Teacher Now On Timor Island

By DICK HELLER, JR. Nearly 10,000 miles southwest of Adams county is a large coral island, called Timor, sweltering under the hot equatorial sun. On this island, Mr. and Mrs. Leonard Kingsley and their seven children, formerly of Berne, are working to find a better way of life for the overcrowded island people. Nearly 300 years of Dutch rule ended 10 years ago for these people, leaving them almost as primitive as when discovered by the early explorers. The present Indonesian government is striving to educate and improve the lot of these unfortunates. Kingsley, former vocational agriculture teacher at the BerneFrench high school, and his family, are agricultural missionaries, sent by the Mennonite church to help the Indonesians. This is their story, just started. (The Kingsleys will spend a total of three years on the island, working with the people.) “Selamat Hari Natal!’* This is the Christmas greeting of the island of Timor, where the birth of Christ falls in the middle of the hot rainy season.. Christmas is a very different thing on Timor. On this sweltering, festering coral island over 800,000 persons sweat their lives away, trying to feed and clothe themselves and their children. Christmas there means no toys, no gifts as we think of them, only more misery. But the picture is not entirely as bleak as that. In this faraway, remote place, others have dedicated their lives so that all people may live better lives. Among these are Mr. & Mrs. Leonard Kingsley and their seven children, formerly of Berne. Two years ago Kingsley decided to become an agricultural missionary to the people of the Indonesian Republic, a long chain of islands lying between Malaya and Australia. Timor is the southernmost major island of the group, lying only 500 miles northwest of Australia. Health Is Problem “We have had. a few recurrences of malaria but our health has been generally good after the first loss of weight,” write the Kingsleys. The big problem is skin infections, as the hot humid climate makes every minor cut a serious sore, taking weeks to heal. The Kingsleys spend part of every day going to school to learn the languages of the Indonesians. There are many ups and downs in trying to understand a new language, they report. Three of their children, Sue, Mitch, and Jane, are attending an Indonesian school every day, and are picking up the language much faster. The schools, they report, are much like American schools in the early 1800’s, and the language and friendship seem to be the main things taught there. The Kingsleys have moved from the “bread and potato basket” of the world, where these foods are staples, into the “rice bowl.” They usually eat the Indonesian rice meal at noon, although the younger children haven’t learned to enjoy it as much, as the older ones. They are able to buy bread daily, and have a cook who has learned to make cinnamon rolls, nut bread and cookies like we have here at home. ■ The arriva lof a refrigerator, after they had lived without one for six months, was greatly ap-

Driver's License Ordered Suspended The Indiana bureau of motor vehicles has announced the suspension of the driver’s license of Harry Thomas Myers, of route catur, for leaving the scene of an accident. The suspension is from Oct. 31 to April 30, 1957.

K z *.* 4r^**’-mU- $ K&raflneF* -* A * <• ■ --ll® y »’■ « ;T /W *' *‘ :< ’ w ■■MraL: w HH>5- • '->.•■ wsri Ml a WK jgMME&, tOL..' qt,. jM For a delightfully different dessert for the holidays, try this Coconut-Cranberry Crumb Pie! Use the traditional cranberry sauce combined with apples and glamorize these fruits to a gourmet treat with tender-flaked coconut. This luscious dessert will give your dinner a surprise finish that is sure to call for many repeat performances throughout the year! Coconut Cranberry Crumb Pie ’/z recipe Pie Crust’" 1% cups (1-pound can) canned 2*4 cups (1 pound 4 oz. can) whole cranberry sauce canned sliced apples 14 cup sugar 2 tablespoons sugar H cup butter or margarine 1 tablespoon flour % cup flour Dash of salt 1 cup tender-thin flaked coconut Line a 9-inch pie pan with pastry, rolled %-lnch thick. Flute edges. Combine apples, 2 tablespoons.sugar, 1 tablespoon flour, and salt; mix well. Turn into pie shell. Break cranberry sauce with fork and spread over apples. Bake in hot oven (425* F.) 30 minutes. Meanwhile combine % cup sugar, butter and 14 cup flour and mix with pastry blender or fork until crumbly. Mix in coconut. Sprinkle over partially baked pie' and bake 20 minutes longer. Serve warm. .. \

MONDAY, DECEMBER 24, 1958

„ ii ■■■■Un ■( predated by the Kingsleys. Canned food from the United States has also kept the food problem to a minimum. Cattle Raising Industry Kingsley finds farming on Timor very complicated. The center of the island is mountainous, with volcanic peaks rising 12,000 feet. But the plains- are'of coral, a white, useless rock. The plains are fertile in spite of this, but almost all the rain falls between November and March, which means the jest of the year is too dry for crops. The principal farm product is cattle. The island, 300 miles long and sixty miles wide, qbout the size of Connecticut and Massachusetts, is hampered by many problems. The .main problem is shipping. It takes a month from the time the cattle are purchased in the mountains until they are delivered in Djakarta, Singapore, and other ports in the area. Only top cattle can survive the rough trip. Even these suffer 20 percent shrinkage. A top animal in the hills weighs less than 800 pounds, and sells there for about 7 or 8 cents a pound. At Kupang, the capital and port of Timor, it is worth 50 cents a pound. In Djakarta, the capital of Indonesia, beef is nearly $2 a pound. Even though the island has three quarters of a million people on it, the sleepy little capital-port of Kupang is smaller than Decatur, less than twice the size of Berne. Shipping space here limits exports from the island to about 600 or 800 head a month. There is an export quota limit of 1,000 head a month, but this is seldom reached. Since only the best animals can make the trip to market, Kingsley points out, inferior stock is kept for breeding. This leads in a vicious cycle to poorer cattle. 1 It is Kingsley.’s hope to be able, with the help of two young col-lege-trained co-workers, to set up an artificial insemination program eventually. Right now, he is busy setting up a new rice mill, to provide this necessary staple for the Indonesians. He has crop demonstration work planned, too. Similar stations throughout the islands will be set up as soon as more workers arrive. Monotonous Weather On Timor the weather is no subject for conversation, Kingsley reports. While they receive about the same rainfall as Indiana, 90 percent of its falls between November and March. Every day is about-the same -length and tem- { perature, because the island lies very near the equator. It is generally sunny there, with the temperature 83 to 85 at noon the year around. At night the temperature drops to 70. One big problem is to get enough vegetable seeds for the Indonesians. Kingsley reports a serious shortage of seeds for leafy vegetables, including Chinese cabbage, ordinary cabbage, even tomatoes. In the Indonesian Republic about 93 percent of the people are Mohammedan, 4 percent Buddhist and Hindu, and 3 percent Christian. There are, Christian communities on every major island. As representatives of modern Christianity, the Kingsleys are helping make Christ a real thing to people who do'not know Him or His way—they are showing that Christianity is a religion of help and hope to everyone.

Stolen Automobile Is Recovered Here A car owned by Lowell Thatcher of Monroe route one, stolen from the Kroger parking lot last Thursday, was recovered over the weekend. It was found abandoned on Piqua road. The city police department is conducting an investigation of the theft.'