While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no guest room available for them. Luke 2:6-7
You know how sometimes a song or hymn gets a grip on you and just won’t let you go? Well, over the last few years that’s happened to me with Stuart Townend’s “From the squalor of a borrowed stable”.
Though it’s not strictly a Christmas carol, it’s certainly suitable for this time of year. But it takes us right through Jesus’ earthly life, and there’s a line in the second verse which always touches me deeply: “Yes, he walked my road and he felt my pain” - ten little monosyllables perfectly summing up the compassion of Jesus! A beautiful hymn.
Mind you, if you wanted to find fault with it, you need look no further than the first line. How so? Well, in all probability, (a) Jesus wasn’t born in squalor, (b) he wasn’t born in a stable, and (c) the place where he was born wasn’t “borrowed”.
Do I hear howls of rage and fury from my friends? “What on earth do you mean? We’ve loved this story since we were little children! Go away, you horrible, nasty man!”
Well, sorry, but the fact is that much of what we believe about the Christmas story comes not from the Bible, but from centuries of schmaltzy hymns and over-sentimental sermons.
For example... We sing about the “three kings”. But who says there were three? Certainly, three gifts are mentioned, but there’s no suggestion that it was one gift per king (who were actually “magi” or “wise men”, not kings). For all we know there might have been twenty of them, each of them bringing some gold, some frankincense and some myrrh.
Perhaps we sing about “the oxen standing by”. But who says there were animals present? Not Matthew or Luke. And as for the sheep, no mention of them either - they were probably left in the fields (with the one unfortunate shepherd who drew the short straw).
And as for “little Lord Jesus no crying he makes”, it’s a case of “don’t get me started”. This isn’t far off heresy. Jesus was fully human as well as fully divine. We know from later on that he could be tired and low in spirits, that he could be angry and disappointed. Perfect man, yes; but superman, no. He will have cried like any other baby (yes, and needed to have his nappy changed too).
And all that stuff about Joseph and Mary forlornly trudging the streets of Bethlehem while door after door is closed in their faces by apologetic, shoulder-shrugging inn-keepers - it’s all read into Luke 2:7, certainly not read out of it.
Kenneth Bailey was a Christian missionary and also a respected Bible scholar. He spent 40 years living in the middle east: he spoke the local languages, and his mind was soaked in the cultural customs of the people among whom he lived.
Pointing out that Joseph, the earthly father of Jesus, was a “son of David”, and that Bethlehem was “the city of David”, he says this: “In such a world a man like Joseph could have appeared in Bethlehem, and told people, ‘I am Joseph, son of Heli, son of Matthat, the son of Levi’, and most homes in the town would have been open to him.” It would have been a shocking disgrace for anybody to have closed their doors to him; it would have been an honour to accommodate him and Mary.
So what actually happened? In all probability (I stress this again, as of course it can’t be proved), Joseph and Mary had planned where they hoped to stay, but when they arrived the guest room (that’s another translation for the “inn”) at the back of the house had been let out to another family (no mobile phones, of course, so the house-owner can’t be blamed for thinking that perhaps Joseph and Mary weren’t going to make it after all).
But rather than turn them away, he cleared a space on the ground floor of his simple open-plan house, the space where, during the night, the animals would be accommodated. No doubt they could be temporarily put elsewhere.
There, using a comfortable manger as a make-shift crib, complete with clean straw, and surrounded by local women (how could they not want to do all they could to help!), Mary gave birth to Jesus.
Squalor? No. Stable? Probably not. Borrowed? No, but quite likely planned and paid for, even if perhaps the rent was reduced because the accommodation given wasn’t as good as the proper guest room.
That’s the way Bailey reconstructs the events of that momentous time. (And he’s no solo voice, by the way - many other experts go along with him.)
But you might ask: Does it actually matter? To which the answer is very simple: Yes and No. But I’ll have to come back to that next time...
(Oh, by the way, Santa Claus doesn’t exist either. Just in case...)
Heavenly Father, please help me this Christmas-time to see the wonderful events surrounding the birth of Jesus with fresh eyes, and so to worship you with fresh joy, hope and faith. Amen.
You know how sometimes a song or hymn gets a grip on you and just won’t let you go? Well, over the last few years that’s happened to me with Stuart Townend’s “From the squalor of a borrowed stable”.
Though it’s not strictly a Christmas carol, it’s certainly suitable for this time of year. But it takes us right through Jesus’ earthly life, and there’s a line in the second verse which always touches me deeply: “Yes, he walked my road and he felt my pain” - ten little monosyllables perfectly summing up the compassion of Jesus! A beautiful hymn.
Mind you, if you wanted to find fault with it, you need look no further than the first line. How so? Well, in all probability, (a) Jesus wasn’t born in squalor, (b) he wasn’t born in a stable, and (c) the place where he was born wasn’t “borrowed”.
Do I hear howls of rage and fury from my friends? “What on earth do you mean? We’ve loved this story since we were little children! Go away, you horrible, nasty man!”
Well, sorry, but the fact is that much of what we believe about the Christmas story comes not from the Bible, but from centuries of schmaltzy hymns and over-sentimental sermons.
For example... We sing about the “three kings”. But who says there were three? Certainly, three gifts are mentioned, but there’s no suggestion that it was one gift per king (who were actually “magi” or “wise men”, not kings). For all we know there might have been twenty of them, each of them bringing some gold, some frankincense and some myrrh.
Perhaps we sing about “the oxen standing by”. But who says there were animals present? Not Matthew or Luke. And as for the sheep, no mention of them either - they were probably left in the fields (with the one unfortunate shepherd who drew the short straw).
And as for “little Lord Jesus no crying he makes”, it’s a case of “don’t get me started”. This isn’t far off heresy. Jesus was fully human as well as fully divine. We know from later on that he could be tired and low in spirits, that he could be angry and disappointed. Perfect man, yes; but superman, no. He will have cried like any other baby (yes, and needed to have his nappy changed too).
And all that stuff about Joseph and Mary forlornly trudging the streets of Bethlehem while door after door is closed in their faces by apologetic, shoulder-shrugging inn-keepers - it’s all read into Luke 2:7, certainly not read out of it.
Kenneth Bailey was a Christian missionary and also a respected Bible scholar. He spent 40 years living in the middle east: he spoke the local languages, and his mind was soaked in the cultural customs of the people among whom he lived.
Pointing out that Joseph, the earthly father of Jesus, was a “son of David”, and that Bethlehem was “the city of David”, he says this: “In such a world a man like Joseph could have appeared in Bethlehem, and told people, ‘I am Joseph, son of Heli, son of Matthat, the son of Levi’, and most homes in the town would have been open to him.” It would have been a shocking disgrace for anybody to have closed their doors to him; it would have been an honour to accommodate him and Mary.
So what actually happened? In all probability (I stress this again, as of course it can’t be proved), Joseph and Mary had planned where they hoped to stay, but when they arrived the guest room (that’s another translation for the “inn”) at the back of the house had been let out to another family (no mobile phones, of course, so the house-owner can’t be blamed for thinking that perhaps Joseph and Mary weren’t going to make it after all).
But rather than turn them away, he cleared a space on the ground floor of his simple open-plan house, the space where, during the night, the animals would be accommodated. No doubt they could be temporarily put elsewhere.
There, using a comfortable manger as a make-shift crib, complete with clean straw, and surrounded by local women (how could they not want to do all they could to help!), Mary gave birth to Jesus.
Squalor? No. Stable? Probably not. Borrowed? No, but quite likely planned and paid for, even if perhaps the rent was reduced because the accommodation given wasn’t as good as the proper guest room.
That’s the way Bailey reconstructs the events of that momentous time. (And he’s no solo voice, by the way - many other experts go along with him.)
But you might ask: Does it actually matter? To which the answer is very simple: Yes and No. But I’ll have to come back to that next time...
(Oh, by the way, Santa Claus doesn’t exist either. Just in case...)
Heavenly Father, please help me this Christmas-time to see the wonderful events surrounding the birth of Jesus with fresh eyes, and so to worship you with fresh joy, hope and faith. Amen.
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