The Birth

Finally, Luke brings us to the great event – the birth of Jesus. But what, from a purely human point of view, an anti-climax it all seems to be! After all the angels and miracles of chapter 1, suddenly we find ourselves at a lowly manger. But such is the humility of the Word made flesh.

At first, it looked like the Roman emperor was running the show, not God. After all, he had ordered everyone to return to their birthplace to be registered in his census for tax purposes. But actually, all he was doing was carrying out God’s will by ensuring that Jesus was born in Bethlehem and not Nazareth. What was so important about Bethlehem? Because this was where Israel’s great King David, from whom the Messiah would be descended (see Isaiah 9:1-7), was born. This was where it had been prophesied that the Messiah too would be born (see Micah 5:2-3). The most powerful man on earth – the Emperor – was therefore simply doing what God wanted him to do.

But there was no palace for this descendant-king. Just a manger – a feeding trough – though almost certainly not in the setting of traditional nativity plays. For just as there is no donkey in the Bible’s version of the Christmas story, so there almost certainly wasn’t an inn from which Mary and Joseph were turned away and a stable in which they set up. The word translated ‘inn’ really means ‘guest room’. Because the whole family had turned up for the census, the guest room was filled to bursting by the time Mary and Joseph arrived; so the area kept for the animals – either in the lower part of the house or perhaps in a separate area – was quickly made hospitable for them instead.

Still today, powerful people like to think they are in control. But they aren’t. God is, as this story reminds us. So when things look like they might be going wrong in life, just trust Him who is bigger and stronger than anyone and anything, and who always has a way of working things round to fit into His purposes.