Let Every Heart Prepare Him Room
I've been singing this lyric for my entire life, and it wasn't until yesterday that I realized what it really meant.
I was reading an article on Advent, which is known as the season (the four Sundays) leading up to Christmas - a tradition like Lent that I never remember to practice because when it comes up, I'm not ready or I haven't given it much thought. This time also, it wasn't until it was mentioned at church this past Sunday that I began to give it more thought.
Advent means coming - back then everyone was waiting for the Messiah to come, longing for the salvation that is Jesus Christ. But unfortunately, society has decided to step in and redefine what Christmas is, with red cups, tacky sweaters, reindeer, lights and lattes. In the midst of all that unfolds the second after midnight on Halloween is quite spectacular, an aisle of red and green appears at your local dollar store, Bublé and Mariah are heard in every radio station, elevator and shopping centre, trees go up and sales begin.
But when we step back from the tangled christmas lights and the broken ornaments, usually we spend Christmas day remembering the birth of Christ, a day when the Son of God was born into this world, as a vulnerable baby, in a manger, with no where to lay His head because "there was no place in the inn" (Luke 2:7). With this story repeated over and over again every year, it's almost become dull to us (I know it has been for me personally), but as I read this other article on Advent, it started to put things into perspective for me.
"Beyond the village and down a dark, twisting rocky path to some ignored, ignoble spot, we suddenly come upon a sight that we find surprisingly disturbing. Not ten feet away, asleep on the ground, near a small fire that has burned down to embers, is a peasant girl. She has bits of straw in her long, messy, dark hair, and she is wrapped in dirty cloaks and a blanket. A split-second look tells us how difficult this night has been for her. And she is so young.
Even more distressing, we see beside her a small, crude, dirty feeding trough in which lays a sleeping newborn, wrapped tightly in unsanitary, blood-smeared cloths.
We take a few tentative steps forward. We know this child, and we know this girl. But the scene is strange to us. It does not look anything like the manger scenes and illustrated books of our childhood. Our Advent traditions did not prepare us for the earthy realness of the real Advent.
Mary is not serene. She’s bone weary. And no divine, heavenly glow emanates from the child. He is not even especially beautiful (Isaiah 53:2). In fact, there is nothing about this child to suggest the unfathomable mystery of who he is. We are unnerved to realize that had we not already known, we would not have recognized him at all.
This scene, the real Christmas, has nothing of the feeling of the Christmas we know. It has all the feel of undesired, desperate homelessness — more like a scene we’d find under a bridge than under our Christmas tree. And we are hit with the shock of a truth we’ve known all our lives: this young girl just gave birth to a baby — the Baby — in a pasture!
Our visceral response is pity and sadness. This poor girl and her baby! We know this story, but as we see it as it really was, it seems so wrong. Our impulse is to do something to help them. We look around but are told that “There was no place for them in the inn” (Luke 2:7). No place? No place besides a field for the Maker of the world? The cosmic incongruity stuns us.
“Surely we can find some room somewhere!” we respond. But can we?
No room to lay His head, our Saviour was born. Both then and now, there seems to be a lack of room for our Lord Jesus - and we begin December today, and as Christmas begins to draw near, let every heart prepare Him room. Let us clear out our minds, our hearts, and our lives a bit more for Jesus, intentionally remembering Him.
Although I still haven't figured out how to go about this season of Advent, but one thing i'll do is follow along one of John Piper's daily advent devotional, "Good News of Great Joy" (which you can download HERE for free). How will you actively prepare yourself for the birth of the King?
;)
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