The Night We Were Left Alone - written by Alfred (a short story for kids)

Once upon a time in a beautiful African city there lived little Murphy and little Mary. Murphy was a Christian but his younger sister, Mary wasn’t a Christian. Murphy was 13 and Mary was 12. They had a little baby brother whose life revolved around crying, sleeping and eating; as is the normal life of every little baby. Their parents who weren’t Christians were somewhere in-between middle class and about to become rich; anyway they were quite sophisticated and where both lovely parents.

One evening, their parents had to attend an important social dinner. All the movers and shakers of the city were to be there. The parents rarely went out in the evening but whenever they did they made sure to hire a babysitter. This evening they hired a young girl to babysit based on a friend’s recommendation. 

When the parents left, the babysitter was quite nice to the kids and let them have fun within the range of the instructions their parents gave. The babysitter was only doing it for the money but at least she wasn’t acting like a witch.

The time agreed upon that the parents would be back and the babysitter would be allowed to go back home gently passed by. 

Then minutes went by. The baby sitter started to get worried. She had already been paid but she had to stay for the parents to return before she could leave – that was the responsible thing to do.

An hour later the parents were still not back. The babysitter got fed up and left in spite of the kids pleading with her to stay. She told them she had her own parents to answer to who she would get in trouble with if she comes back home late; after her curfew. She also added that what the kids parents were doing to her isn’t fair. They shouldn’t keep her waiting so long after the agreed time she was paid for.

Thus, Murphy and Mary where left alone with their little baby brother. They were scared for themselves – they had never been left alone at night. To make matters worse they had to look after their little baby brother. Feeling unprotected themselves they would have to protect.

They soon got scared of every little noise in the house. They got so scared that they were even too scared to watch TV.

Like if things weren’t going bad enough, the baby started crying. Murphy and Mary didn’t know what to do but when they tried to carry the baby it didn’t take a genius to know that the baby was sick because not only did the baby throw up on them, the baby’s temperature was off the charts. It literally felt like the baby was burning up.

Now was to the time to get scared. Whatever would they do? They can’t drive to the hospital – they are just little kids. They can’t call anyone because they had no phone at home and they couldn’t even begin to guess what medicine the baby needed. Everything was just a tragedy becoming more tragic by the second.

Suddenly, Murphy remembered that he had a God he can call on in times of trouble.

Murphy laid hands on the baby and started to pray.

Mary taught he was crazy and started asking him if he was crazy as she started getting really mad at him.

Murphy didn’t listen to Mary. He didn’t let her distract him. He continued praying for the baby until he started crying while praying. They weren’t tears of unbelief;they were tears of a burdened heart.

Minutes later, the baby’s temperature started to drop. Murphy smiled while he still continued to pray. 

In no time the baby’s temperature was quite normal and the baby had stopped crying.

Mary couldn’t believe her eyes. She told Murphy who had obviously gotten born again while watching Christian TV to tell her about Jesus. Before the next 30 minutes was over she too was a born again believer in Jesus.

Their parents returned late into the night. They apologized a lot for being late and told them that the social evening dinner they attended was held up by the police who raided the event to catch a famous jewelry thief in disguise who they later caught.

Murphy and Mary told their parents all that had happened since they left. 

The parents checked the baby and the baby was quite alright. 

The parents were amazed and glad. They decided they all would go to church on the upcoming Sunday. When Sunday came and they attended church, they liked it so much that they promised to come again. 

Months later, the parents got born again in church and the whole family lived together; happily in victory in Christ for ever after.

THE END.