The Quiet Star - one for the little ones!
Once upon a time there was a young star. She didn’t have any friends because all the other stars laughed at her. You see, she wasn’t small and neat and confident like they were, she was quiet and shy and had very long points, but when she shone she always put her whole heart into doing it.
“Why can’t you just twinkle lightly like us, you are far too bright and long and ugly!” the other stars sneered. But the quiet star loved to shine.
One day an Angel came to the skies and said:
“I need a bright and beautiful star to shine above a special place.”
All the stars volunteered at once and started fighting amongst themselves. All except the quiet star who knew that the Angel would never choose her when there were so many stars more beautiful than she was.
“Choose me!” they shouted.
“No me, I’m better than her!”
“Actually - I’m the best star in the sky!”
But when the Angel said she wanted the star to shine over a small, poor, stable they all changed their minds. None of them wanted to light up a little, scruffy place where animals lived. They wanted to stand over rich, exciting and famous places.
“Get her to do it!” they said pointing at the quiet star. “She’ll be quite happy hanging over a dirty little stable!”
“Would you shine your brightest over the stable where a baby is to be born tonight?” asked the Angel.
“I would love to do that for you,” said the quiet star with a big smile and she followed the Angel to a lowly stable in Bethlehem.
The quiet star stood in the sky over the stable and looked down.
She saw a lady riding on a donkey and a man talking to an innkeeper who was shaking his head. He had no room at his inn for travellers and every inn for miles around was full.
“That is a man called Joseph with his wife Mary,” explained the Angel. “She is carrying a very special baby in her tummy.”
The star watched as the innkeeper showed the couple and their donkey to his stable where they could rest. Then, some time later, she heard a new born baby cry.
“Shine your brightest, little star,” said the Angel, “It is your job to lead people to this new born king.”
“A King!” said the star in amazement and the Angel nodded.
“Yes a king who is also the Son of God”
When they heard this, the other stars in the sky shouted to the Angel.
“She is far too ugly and bright to be such a special King’s star! Change her for one of us instead!”
But the Angel smiled at the quiet star.
“She is the perfect star for the job! The loveliest star a King could wish for.”
The star was so proud that she twinkled hard and, with her light, she guided shepherds in their fields to the little stable, so that they could worship the baby.
And then she shone her brightest so that three wise men who were travelling from many, many miles away in the East could see her. They had been about to set off in the wrong direction until they saw her starlight and thanks to her, they found the baby in the little stable and brought him their gifts of gold and sweet smelling frankincense and perfume of myrrh.
And when Mary and Joseph and the baby had to flee Bethlehem, the Star gently faded so that they could leave the stable in the dark safely out of harm’s way, for a nasty King called Herod was trying to find the baby to kill him.
The baby escaped and grew up to be a very special man indeed. A man called Jesus.
And as for the lowly quiet star, she became the best remembered and most famous star ever… the beautiful King’s Star, outshining any other star that ever shone in the sky.
Back to Short Stories main page
