The Red Dragon Problem

 A long, long, time ago, in a kingdom far away. . .

Magi men from the east arrived in Jerusalem, saying, “Where is He?”

When Herod the king heard this, he got really upset, something terrible.

Later, when he figured out that the Magi had tricked him, he got even more bent out of shape. So he sent his thugs to execute all the male babies in Bethlehem and its vicinity. 

Overkill, literally.

But that mini-holocaust didn’t pan out the way he hoped it would: No king of the Jews was slain. They didn't even find one, at least not yet. 

Herod  the Anti (first of many) and his diabolical minions shape-shifted their way through history, never giving up the search for that kid on whom they would inflict the final solution.

Later, after the had child grown, administered miraculous grace and healing to hundreds, if not thousands, of the locals—Jews and others who happened to be in the vicinity—Herod and his well-connected allies were able to find Him. They convinced Governor Pilate to do their dirty work and so he did and they hung the troublemaker up, Roman style, on a cross and they thought they had solved the problem of the upstart Galilean. But that bloody execution put Him out of commission for only three days.

The Executed One bounced back. 

Later, we got a fuller report from Patmos, a little more back-story: 

When the dragon realized that he had been thrown down to the earth, he got really pissed off and, as things went down,  he persecuted the woman who had given birth to the male child.

That old red dragon would pop up every now and then in history to do his dirty work and take another shot at eliminating the problem. 

Eventually, he came up with a plan that would surely be a final solution.

But persecuted Yids got by with a little help from their friends, the Brits, the Yanks,  and a few airborne others. . .

"The two wings of the great Eagle were given to the woman, so that she could fly into the wilderness, to her place, where she could be nourished for a time, times and half a time"

(as the Times reported from Patmos)

Sometimes destiny takes a long, long time to work itself out.

Glass half-Full