When we tell the Nativity story in our churches in the form of Christmas plays, we usually sanitize it down first. Maybe we just portray it in the best way we know how according to what we were taught.
We all prefer everything nice and tidy, controllable, and familiar. We place God inside of the box we made for Him. We choose the congregation’s most well-behaved kids to play Mary and Joseph; one or both are usually the Pastor’s children. The shepherds, wise men, and even the angelic hosts are the kids who fit the part and are able to stand still enough. They fit the mold, looking and talking like we do. We tell the same story just the way we’d like it to be. Yet, that very first Christmas was everything but neat and tidy with the characters of our own choosing. It was God’s story and, in fact, just the opposite.
While expecting a child, Mary and Joseph were being pushed around like branded cattle by a heavy-handed ruler named Caesar Augustus. The lunatic ruler called for a public census which sent people scrambling back to their place of birth. Mary was probably thirteen or fourteen years of age; Joseph was only a few years older. They were both currently under public scrutiny in the small town they were living in. Mary wasn’t yet married yet everyone knew she was pregnant – a sin, in that culture and time, that was worthy of death by public stoning. The court wasn’t exactly buying into the “by a virgin birth” excuse and wanted her dead. From the common spectators’ eyes, this wasn’t exactly the model couple that we’d ask to be a part of our Christmas play. As a matter of fact, the congregation might have asked them to leave the church.
The job of a shepherd was obviously to tend to, care for, and protect a flock of sheep. It’s easy in modern times to portray this job as a divine calling on that very first Christmas Eve.
But truthfully, it was everything but.
A shepherd was usually a job that men took if they couldn’t find another – the very last choice in a career. Shepherds were usually uneducated, unemployed, and not able to find any other work. These men most likely didn’t speak or write extremely well; they possibly may even have been illiterate. Their choice topics of conversation that very first Christmas were most likely whatever guys talk about sitting around while working the overnight shift. This is exactly the group of men God chose to announce, witness, and tell others about His incarnation.
Strange choice in cast, isn’t it?
There’s a knock at the door this evening. It’s a really young couple who are obviously and visibly, expecting a baby any day now. Possibly even any moment. The person running the “inn” takes a look at them and a look around inside the inn. They see a couple that’s probably going to be up all night, a night that could very well include a crying newborn. Labor can take anywhere from hours to days and is usually messy, loud, and complicated. The innkeeper must have figured that the other guests inside the motel needed their peace, quiet, and rest, much more than this young family needed a safe place to give birth.
“There’s no more room at this in. Try the animal stable out back. There may even be some old rags left out there that you can wrap your baby in when He arrives.”
That very first Christmas speaks of how God chooses unlikely characters and unsanitized circumstances as part of His redemption story. He works through the messy situations that humans have made and even the offenses we commit towards one another. He uses it all for good in the end.
Just because your own personal life story hasn’t been the most neat, tidy, and controllable, it certainly doesn’t mean that God isn’t still weaving, working, and writing your life story.
In a way only He can.
