(Isaiah 53:5 & Luke 2:7)
No room for Jesus? No room for the King of Kings? No, but room for others and for other things. There was no room for Jesus in the world that He had made – imagine! Things have not really changed since that Bethlehem night over two-thousand years ago. God is still on the fringes of most of our lives. We fit Him in when it is convenient for us, but we become irritated when He makes demands on us. If God would only stay in his little box and come out when we pull the string!
Our lives are so full. There is so much to be done. But in all our busy activities are we in danger of excluding from our hearts and lives the One who made us?
Jesus’ life began in the midst of persecution and peril. He came on a mission of love and mercy, sent by the Father. An angel announced His conception and gave Him His name. The heavenly host sang a glorious anthem at His birth. By the extraordinary star, the very heavens indicated His coming. He was the most illustrious child ever born – the holy child of Mary, the divine Son of God.
Yet no sooner did He enter our world than Herod decreed His death and labored to accomplish it. Warned by God in a dream, Joseph fled Bethlehem at night, taking Mary and the baby Jesus to Egypt until Herod’s death finally made it safe to return.
The Son of the eternal Father, Jesus, entered time and was made in the likeness of man. He assumed our human nature with all its infirmities, weaknesses, and capacity for suffering. He came as a child of the poorest parents. His entire life was one long pathway of humiliation. Now He is in heaven, no longer limited by time and space. And someday He will come again – His time in glory – to take us to Himself.
Be blessed at this season of the year as we await His return!
Merry Christmas,
Pastor John