Devotions this week based on Come Home Week 1 – PLACE (WATCH HERE)
If it weren’t for the angelic messengers, I wonder if the shepherds would have believed it.
What if someone came to you and said, “A King has been born!” and then proceeded to say, “Go find him in the feeding trough of the local rancher down the road.”
You probably would have gone on with your day.
Kings don’t get laid in a manger.
Except one.
Jaroslav Vajda in his hymn, “Where Shepherds Lately Knelt” penned these words in verse 2:
In that unlikely place
I find him as they said:
Sweet newborn Babe, how frail!
And in a manger bed:…
Luke recorded (2:7) And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.
Just the facts. Luke “carefully investigated” all the things about the life of Christ. It was accurate, Mary laid her son, the King of kings and Lord of lords, in a manger.
The shepherds confirmed it when they went to see what the angels said, (Luke 2:12) “This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”
The unlikely setting of Christ’s birth was so unique that it was the telltale sign that the shepherds found the right baby.
Jesus would be different from earthly kings. His birth was simply the first of many places you would not expect to see the Son of God.
The birth of Christ was not staged for royalty but surrounded in humility. God did not choose a palace. He chose a feeding trough. Heaven did not arrive with spectacle but with silence and straw.
God didn’t have to come in flesh with flash and fanciness. He wasn’t coming to impress the elite or stand out from the middle class. He was coming to serve the people he loved. He was willing to set aside his divine palace to take on flesh in a setting made for animals, but was the setting that the Creator entered his creation.
The manger reveals God’s heart. It communicates the servant’s heart Jesus had. It highlights his humility even as he was announced by heavenly hosts.
It was the perfect place to enter our world to take care of our greatest need: a solution for sin.
God hasn’t changed.
He is still showing up in unexpected places. He shows up in our weakness to bring strength. He shows up in our pain to provide healing. He shows up in our disappointment to give encouragement. He shows up in our shame to bring forgiveness.
All unexpected places…yet ones that God is willing to show up.
Apply: Where have I stopped expecting God to show up? What “manger” in my life might God be using?
Prayer: Jesus, You were not deterred by dirt or danger. Come into our lives. Take up residence in our ordinary moments and show yourself present in the unexpected ones. Amen.