Making Room to Love You More

The Birth of Jesus Christ

2 In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. 2 This was the first registration when[a] Quirinius was governor of Syria. 3 And all went to be registered, each to his own town. 4 And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, 5 to be registered with Mary, his betrothed,[b] who was with child. 6 And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth. 7 And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.[c]

Here we will dwell for a bit. Here at the stable. We will not rush. We will not hurry to the fields for the shepherds, but here, in the dark; in the grit, in the earthiness of the stable, where the Light of the World took His first breaths, we pause.

It was time for the Savior to arrive but there was no room for him in the inn. It was God’s plan that Jesus would be born in the most lowly of circumstance but it doesn’t change the fact that it was not a place of comfort or cleanliness. We glorify the humble birth in hindsight, but for Mary the closed door to one in her circumstances must have been frightening and confusing. Here was a girl, no older than 16, without her Mama, about to give birth for the first time (and to the Savior no less) and Bethlehem had no room. No matter how warm and “normal” any author or expert may try make this scenario; no matter if it was a ramshackle lean-to barn or a cozy cave in the side of rock face, regardless of whether or not people in that culture shared their homes with their livestock, this was not the ideal place to bring your first born into the world.

Mary and Joseph had to cling to one another and to God’s promises that night, because this could not have been what they imagined. They had endured the shame of society for a pregnancy before marriage. They had been open to God using them in any way He saw fit, but how could this baby be born in a place that was so clearly, well, unfit?

Although God’s people had prayed and prepared for a Messiah, when the time came, there was no room for him.

Is there room in our lives for the Savior today? It is so cliché to talk about the hustle and bustle of Christmas, but what about the hustle and bustle of our lives? What about the mental and emotional clutter that we carry with us from an unkind word or an unkind world? We are a Prozac nation in part because there is not time or room to process life. We wear our anxiety on our sleeves because the world is constantly taking, taking, taking and we have forgotten how to say “NO, that part of my life is not yours.” If we are not slowing down to replenish from the Living Water then we give the savior an inhospitable home. There has to be a place where we make room for Jesus; there must be room for the sacred in our lives. Have you made room at the stable? At Christmas may we begin to make room in our lives to see the savior more clearly. To see that all of this, this “stuff”, this life, this existence is all God's to start with… and that’s a good place to start over.

"You’ve been loving me since time began You’re behind my every second chance I love You I’m trying to Love You more I’m ready Please help me Love You more"