Day Twenty

Our salvation story began on a starry night in Bethlehem when Jesus was born to a virgin mother in a stable. An arrival both miraculous and modest, where meekness and majesty met in a manger. In that humble bed of straw, the King of Kings lay surrounded by the sound of animals instead of the songs of angels. He willingly exchanged authority for vulnerability as He stepped into humanity in its most fragile form – the Infinite became an infant for the sole purpose of saving our souls.

‘The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.’ (John 1:14)

Jesus left the glory of Heaven to live among us in the ordinary, to make a way for us to live with Him without barrier. Jesus didn’t choose a perfect setting for His birth, just as He doesn’t expect a perfect version of us before we can draw near to Him. He didn’t simply come to humanity, He came into it – into its fragility, its messiness, its hopefulness and hopelessness. Christ isn’t confined to candlelit churches or carefully curated moments; He meets us in the raw and unpolished parts of our everyday lives. Scripture tells us that He is Immanuel, God with us (Matthew 1:23) – with us right where we are, not where we think we should be.

His birth in a stable teaches us that nothing is too messy or too unfinished for His presence. We don’t need to tidy our lives or our hearts before we come to Him. His birth to a virgin mother in a stable reminds us that God willingly steps into the places where we feel unworthy, unseen, overwhelmed or ashamed. If Glory can rest in the straw, then His grace can surely rest on us.

As we approach Christmas, I encourage you to invite God into the ‘stables’ of your life – the parts that feel messy, inadequate or empty. Because it was in the straw, not the splendour, that His glory first appeared. And it is often in our own places of need that His presence shines the brightest.