Mary and Joseph have traveled some eighty miles from
Nazareth to Bethlehem to be registered for the Roman census. The journey took
at least three days. They finally arrived first at Jerusalem and then would
have continued the five or six more miles south to Bethlehem. But when they
arrived there, the place was packed. Joseph pushed his way inside the inn to
beg and plead for a room for by now the birth of Jesus was imminent.
Some commentators believe that this was an inn which had a
long history. It was known as Chimham's Inn (2 Sam. 19:38-40; Jer. 41:17) and
was built by that loyal servant of David after he became a member of David's
inner circle.
Can you imagine the innkeeper seeing Mary about to have a
baby and still telling Joseph that there was "No room!" "We are
full. You can see that for yourself. There's not one room vacant." Then, as
an afterthought, he said, "But there's the cattle shed. Maybe you could
make do there."
"No room!" But that was not really true. Think
about it! There was the innkeeper's own room, but he never once considered
that. No indeed! Let these peasants with the Nazareth accent make do with the
shed. The "cattle shed" of such an Eastern inn was often a cave,
which seems to have been the case here.
So, in a rough, cold cave attached to an ancient inn, the
Son of God entered into human life. Oxen shook their shaggy heads, and camels
looked around with disdain. The floor was unspeakably foul. Bats flew in and
out. No hot water, sanitation, or midwife was available. In the nearby inn,
paying guests called for food and drink and sang songs or sought their beds.
The awesome Child was born at last. Joseph knocked some
boards together to make a manger and lined it with straw, and the wondrous
Child slept, wrapped in swaddling clothes. The word Luke used for
"swaddling" is one of his medical terms. It means
"bandages," so even in the midst of newborn life is a hint of death.
“No room!” No room for Jesus! I hope you get the picture.
We read in 2 Corinthians 8:9, “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus
Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that you
through His poverty might become rich.” The
Creator of the universes comes into this world, robed in human flesh and is
born a dirty cave used for the animals of the travelers staying in the inn. The
innkeeper or anyone of the travelers probably had the opportunity to give up their
room for this precious Baby to be born, but they selfishly denied and rejected
this awesome and wonderful privilege!
I love what Oswald Chamber says on his December 25 devotion
in Utmost for His Highest: “Jesus Christ was born into this world, not from it.
He did not evolve out of history; He came into history from the outside. Jesus
Christ is not the best human being, He is a Being Who cannot be accounted for
by the human race at all. He is not man becoming God, but God Incarnate, God
coming into human flesh, coming into it from outside. His life is the Highest
and the Holiest entering in at the Lowliest door. Our Lord's birth was an
advent.”
“Just as Our Lord came into human history from outside, so
He must come into me from outside. Have I allowed my personal human life to
become a "Bethlehem" for the Son of God? I cannot enter into the
realm of the Kingdom of God unless I am born from above by a birth totally
unlike natural birth. "Ye must be born again." This is not a command,
it is a foundation fact. The characteristic of the new birth is that I yield
myself so completely to God that Christ is formed in me. Immediately Christ is
formed in me, His nature begins to work through me.”
Yes, like that dirty cave, our hearts are dirty, sinful, deceitful,
and desperately wicked (Jeremiah 17:9), but Jesus is willing to be born into
it, cleanse it, and make all the difference in the world for you! Do you have
room in your heart today for Jesus?
God bless!
