Where should I begin?
Um… How about the beginning?
In the beginning, there was nothing.
Kind of like a dark empty region in outer space.
Although there wasn’t any darkness at all.
Or space.
Or time.
Anyways, the point is, from nothing, I created something.
First there was light. And it was good.
Then there was a sky, water, and land. And they were good.
And then there were plants. And they were good.
I was on quite a streak.
So I followed up by adding a sun, moon, and stars.
And—you guessed it—they were good.
Then there were birds, fish, insects, and animals.
They were also good.
And finally, I made human beings in my own image. (Well—pretty much in my own image. Aside from the fact that I’m invisible.)
And they were good.
And that was it.
An entire universe.
It took me a week.
(In fact, I finished a day early and spent Sunday watching football. —By the way, I started on Monday—)
Then one day, mankind at some forbidden apples. And everyone was pointing fingers at someone else.
The man blamed it on the woman.
The woman blamed it on a talking snake.
The snake blamed it on a talking bush.
And the bush blamed it on the Democrats.
So I punished man.
No more free room and board in Eden.
And then what happened?
I turned my back for a millennium or two, and the next thing I knew, people were really evil.
So I, uh, did a little remodeling, and dropped some people off in Turkey.
And a few hundred years later, I told someone he’d be entitled to a Promised Land.
But I didn’t give it to him right away.
Why?
I’ll tell you why!
If you just hand things over to people, they usually won’t think much of them. But make them wait a half a millennium, and believe me, they’ll treasure it like it’s the Holy Grail. (I mean, even nowadays, a few thousand years later, they’re still pretty attached to their land.)
Anyways, I sent my chosen one’s descendants to Egypt, and made them wait a while. Although to be perfectly honest, I thought they were still hanging out in their native land. I got a little distracted with running one of my other universes, and I just plumb forgot about them.
(But on the plus side, their stay in Egypt made for a pretty good story.)
So I led my people out of Egypt, gave them a few hundred laws , made them wait another few decades (—again, you gotta make them wait—), and gave them a chunk of land about the size of New Jersey.
And all in all, I’d say they had a pretty good time there.
But they ended up worshipping other gods (I tried to tell them I was jealous, but they just wouldn’t listen), and I more or less brought their kingdom to an end.
But after a while, I felt like the market was ripe for a sequel—so I sent my son down to shake things up a bit.
Or did I send myself down?
I’m not sure.
Either way, my son and/or I took the form of a bearded long-haired fellow in sandals, and went on a mission preaching to and healing the people, turning water into wine and ice into popsicles, riding reindeer and delivering gifts, hopping around in a bunny suit and laying chocolate eggs, building a flying treehouse out of magic wood, and using the tree house to go from town to town with my twelve partners in Christ.
Part Two was hardly anything like Part One—and most people really noticed.
In fact, one group was so upset about the changes that it banded together and killed me.
(I don’t want to say who, but I’ll give you a clue: it starts with a “J,” and rhymes with “Jews.”)
I knew what was coming, but I decided to go with it.
Why?
Well, if you must know why, I’ll tell you:
Because I told you a long time ago that all of this would happen.
Why?
If you ask me one more question, I’m going to have Zeus send a lightning bolt down there and toast your tuchis.
But getting back to our story, I rose from the dead, did my thing for a few more weeks, and then relocated uptown and moved back in with my self and my other self.
Oh yeah: Don’t steal, don’t kill, love others, say your prayers, take your vitamins, wear clean underwear, do unto others, yada yada yada.
Amen.