Here we are again! Back to December and another year gone! Where does the time go? At the risk of turning into all my elders it really is true that time seems to go quicker when you get older! 

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I love Christmas, for lots of reasons; being with family, the decorations and the "magic" of the occasion, the traditions, and of course the food! ;-) 

But in amongst all the wonderful fairy tales and excitement of gift giving and receiving of Christmas we are progressively hearing less and less of the real reason we have a Christmas. The birth of Jesus Christ now gets pushed to the back and treated as almost a second class fictional story after those of Father Christmas and Elf on the shelf! 

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But we have to remember that this is not merely another story, that the birth of Christ is a well documented, well attested too historical event; not even atheist scholars will deny Jesus was a historical figure born in Bethlehem over 2000 years ago. Without his birth, the world as you know it now would be very very different - with all most all of our western history and culture being founded upon Christian teachings set out by Christ in his lifetime. He is undoubtedly - even in a purely human context - the most important figure in world history, bar none. 

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Now as a Christian obviously I fully believe he was much more than just a man, but as a Vet, Im also fascinated at how at his birth, other than his mother Mary and earthly father Joseph, the only other witnesses to the birth of this world changing figure, were animals. The animals present in the lowly stable in which this changer of lives and nations would be humbly born. The next time you see a lamb, sheep or cow or horse, remember their distant Middle Eastern relatives were likely present at this mans birth. No King, politician, religious leader or wealthy man had that privilege. But then the animals present in that stable also knew who he was; their creator. 

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And in all this we must not forget the humble donkey - the animal we sing of in carols like "Little Donkey" carrying Christs mother Mary to the stable, and then 33 years later another donkey carried him into Jerusalem to face the most horrific death on a cross despite his innocence (also historically undisputed I might add).  

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So this Christmas when you look at a christmas card, depicting the birth of Christ - remember those animals in that scene had the privilege to meet the God-Man before any other and recognised him for who he was. The question is - do you?