Journey back in time to the faraway Biblical land of Palestine in thirty-something A.D. Experience the greatest story ever told from a unique perspective in this religious parody of a children's game book for adults. In You Are the Messiah!, take a humorous and irreverant journey through the life of Jesus Christ-the lives he touches, the miracles he executes, and the roads he travels during the most tumultuous period of his life-from the clumsy beginning of his ministry, to the development of his fabled miracle-working powers, and ultimately, to his tortured sacrifice on the cross as he struggles with becoming humanity's unlucky savior. Turn the page, but watch out. The choices made at the end of each plot point can either further the story along the correct path, lead to crazy side stories, or end in a comically brutal death-or much worse. Along the way, you'll get the chance to answer one age-old question: What would Jesus really do?

YOU ARE THE MESSIAH!

By BROCK LABORDE

iUniverse, Inc.

Copyright © 2010 Brock LaBorde
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4502-6896-7

Chapter One

A knock on the curtain of your hut jolts you out of a strange dream.

With half-opened eyes, you grumble for your parents, Mary and Joseph, to answer the door.

When the knocking starts up again, you remember that today is the day that your parents were taking your younger brothers and sisters to watch a group of harlots get stoned to death.

You've got the whole day to yourself!

You jump up from your bed of dust and rocks and take three steps forward—passing through the living room, kitchen, dining room, kitchenette, and foyer—to the front door of your family's tiny hut.

Pulling back the door curtain, you see your best friend, Simon Peter Timothy, excitedly jumping up and down.

"Jesus, Jesus!"

He's yelling and pulling your arm.

"Put on your swimming robe and let's get going! We've really got to hoof it if we're going to make it to the River Jordan by noon!"

That's right! You forgot that you had planned to go on a double-date with Simon Peter Timothy and a couple of girls at the river today.

You change out of your sleeping robe, throw on your sandals, and head out the door.

Before you leave, you scribble a note on some papyrus for your parents in case they return before you do.

It reads:

"Gone fig hunting. Fear ye not, for I shall return very soon.

Love, JC"

Turn to the NEXT PAGE

"Are we really going on a date? Like, with girls? My parents would totally crucify me if they knew we were doing this," you tell Simon Peter Timothy as the two of you begin the long trek across town.

"Jesus, you're thirty-two years old," he replies. "You're not some little baby boy away in a manger anymore. Besides, it might really be worth getting in trouble over. I heard that your date, Mary, flashed her bare shoulder to some boys behind the youth synagogue last week."

For a moment, you fantasize about Mary's naked shoulder hanging out for all the world to see, but soon your thoughts drift back to the time your parents caught you preaching in the temple when you were a teenager. They sure were sore about it, and you don't want to disappoint them like that again.

Gee, that seems like so long ago, you wonder.

And indeed it was, roughly 20 years. Oddly enough, you can't remember much else that's happened in your life, either before or after that day. It's like you were a baby one day and then a teenager the next, and now you're suddenly a middle-aged man.

Regardless, you're pretty certain that you haven't preached anywhere ever since that day when you were twelve.

Lately, though, you've been having these weird dreams that you were a preacher, and a darn famous one at that ...

Simon Peter Timothy slugs you in the arm. "Don't worry about what your stuffy-ass parents say, Jesus. You're so naïve! You honestly believe that your parents were virgins when they were your age?"

"My mom definitely was. I think she still is," you say.

"You'll be fine. You need to live a little, dude."

He's right. But then again, Simon Peter Timothy has a knack for making you ignore your responsibilities, which is one reason why your parents don't like you hanging out with him.

Another reason is that he's a filthy Gentile and you're Jewish.

You relax and the two of you continue on your way.

Later, you are both thirsty and exhausted from the intense midday heat and from swatting at the swarms off lies and gnats that follow everyone around all the time.

"Sheesh! Are we having another insect plague or what?" Simon Peter Timothy asks, frustrated.

"Maybe people are falling behind on their sacrifices to Jehovah," you offer.

As you approach the river, you notice that it's a lot more populated than it usually would be on a day like this. A crowd is gathered along both sides of the riverbank, watching a man who shouts and splashes about in the waist-deep water.

"Aw cripes! That John the Baptist dude is out here baptizing people again," Simon Peter Timothy laments. "He's absolutely bat-shit crazy about baptisms."

You scan the dense crowd, but don't see any sign of your dates, so the two of you decide to watch John the Baptist scream and dunk people's heads underwater for a while.

As Simon Peter Timothy looks for a good seat on the muddy bank, you walk down to the river's edge for a quick sip of water.

"Hey there! You with the beard, robe, and sandals!" a voice shouts.

Every man in attendance (including you) starts looking around, pointing at themselves, and asking aloud, "Who? Me?"

"Yeah you!" the voice answers.

Finally you follow the voice to its source and see that it's John the Baptist and he's pointing right at you, a crazed look in his eyes.

"You look like you're in need of a real good baptizing, yessir!" he screams. "So get your filthy, un-baptized self out here and let me baptize you!"

Ugh! How mortifying! It feels like everyone in the world is staring at you right now.

Turn to PAGE 8

You arrive at the wedding just in time to see your mother, Mary, and your sister, Mary, busily braiding some baskets as last-minute wedding gifts. Feeling like you're not yet ready to confront them and defend your recent Messianic expedition, you attempt to duck out of their line of sight.

Just then, a man waves and calls out from across the pavilion, "Hey, Jesus!"

You freeze and attempt to signal the man to shut up, but he doesn't get it.

"Thanks so much for healing my lame brother," he says in an even louder voice. "Man, he was the lamest dude ever before you came along!"

Hearing this, your mother looks up and immediately spots you. Throwing her basket down, she charges at you and pinches your ear so hard that she almost tears it off.

"Jesus Theodore Christ! You have quite some bit of explaining to do, young man!" she bellows. "You don't come home for months and I hear you're performing miracles all over town? What, you couldn't find the time to turn some trees into hundreds of collectible cat statues to help out your poor father who's breaking his back with all his carpentering? And what's with all this preaching? Who taught you how to sermonize like that?"

"Ma, hold on. It's not so easy to explain," you whine. "You'd probably need a ridiculously thick, confusing book and half a million derivative self-help books to even begin to understand whatever ministry it is that I've started here."

Before she can respond, someone announces that it's time for the wedding couple to make their big wedding toast.

Everyone falls respectfully silent as the young bride and groom say a few cute words to one another and then clink their goblets.

However, their clinks sound more like hollow thuds, and when they take their sips, they find there's no wine in their goblets.

"We're all out of wine!" the bride screams, glaring at the groom before storming off into the honeymoon hut and repeatedly attempting to slam the curtain shut.

The wedding planner drags a few jugs of water out of a house.

"Oh God! There's been some sort of mix-up. Somebody accidentally watered the camels with all of the wine!"

So that explains why the camels started brawling, having sex, and then crashed out of their pens a little...