“And she gave birth to her firstborn son; and she wrapped Him in cloths, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn” (Luke 2:7).
We have so romanticized the stable as the birthplace of Jesus that we have forgotten the unsanitary and unsavory conditions it would have presented to a young mother giving birth to her first child. This was not a romantic place for anyone to spend the night much less give birth to the King of kings.
The census had caused a large number of people to travel to Bethlehem and thus the lack of space in the inn. It would have been apparent to any observer that Mary’s condition was critical, no one was will to give up their accommodation to Mary and Joseph. The result was that the audience for the birth of the King was barnyard animals. Justin Martyr (c. A.D. 150) states that the stable was in a cave.
Without any pomp or circumstance the greatest event of all of the history of mankind had taken place. God in human flesh had entered into His creation to bring redemption to fallen Man. The Son had left the glory of heaven and humbled Himself to be born as a human child in the lowliest circumstances imaginable.
When I read the simple phrase—“no room in the inn”—it occurs to me that what many of the inhabitants and visitors to Bethlehem had done in their ignorance is done today out of simple indifference. They had no place for Christ in the inn and we make no place for Him in our life and in our plans. Don’t neglect the Christ of Christmas.
Prayer: Father, I am sometimes guilty of crowding you out of my everyday affairs. Forgive me. Amen