Joy to the World (2)

On Christmas Eve, Joy's family hustled around preparing for the holiday. Her father was a family man and had taken several days off work. Joy was a poster child for holiday cheer, dancing around and grinning.

After dinner, the family piled into their car and headed to church for the Christmas Eve service.

Snowflakes drifted down as they walked into the old building. Immediately they were surrounded by joyful melodies of Christmas carols.

A man stood up and read the story Joy had learned on her mother's knee. It was about a baby named Jesus who was born in the town of Bethlehem. This baby was God's Son. He had come to live on Earth out of love and to be with people who desperately needed him.

Joy's thoughts kept turning back to Nick. It must be miserable to be lonely on Christmas, a day that celebrates God's Son coming to Earth. Tears started to run down her cheeks, but she brushed them away. She didn't want to look like a crybaby.


Info Cloud
Teaching Topic: What Is a Holiday?教學主題: 何謂Holiday？
National Holiday 國訂假日
bank holiday 英式說法的國訂假日
holiday 英國人指渡假
美國人會用 vacation

Grammar Gym
"It must be miserable to be lonely on Christmas."
It must be [adjective] to be [description of a situation].
- It must be great to be finished with your research paper so early.
- It must be depressing to be working in the office on a Friday night.

Language Lab
hustle v.
to hurry in doing something or going somewhere:
- We have to hustle if we want to catch the train.
- Derek hustled up to his room to get his school bag.
hustle n.
busy and noisy activity:
- Hanna doesn't like the hustle of city life.

drift v.
to move slowly on water or in the air
- The boat drifted away from the dock without anyone noticing.
- The hot-air balloon drifted above the plains.
- We drifted down the stream and reached the ocean after several hours.

desperately adv.
in a desperate way
- The patient desperately needs a heart transplant.
- The lost boy's parents are looking for him desperately.
desperate adj.
willing to do anything to change a very bad situation, and not caring about danger:
- The couple were desperate to have a baby.

miserable adj.
extremely unhappy, for example because you feel lonely, cold, or badly treated:
- Tom looks miserable after Sandi broke up with him.
- Wesley is really miserable living on his own.
making you feel very unhappy, uncomfortable etc:
- Who would want to go out in such miserable weather?

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