A couple of years ago, I found this blog by Missy Dollahon called It's Almost Naptime (link in the sidebar). She is a fellow Texan and Christian, and she is delightful. Every year, she posts this essay about Christ's birth, and I love the perspective she gives on the whole scene. This year, I find it especially poignant, because my heart is bleeding for some friends and family who have particularly difficult challenges in their lives. Sometimes, it's just nice to know that we aren't alone in our "stables", and that nobody, even the mother of the Savior, is exempt from them.
We're Expecting
by Missy Dollahon
I have been thinking a lot about Mary lately, being
that it is Christmas and all. Actually since I first became pregnant
with my first child Shepherd, Mary has been constantly on my mind.
On
Christmas Eve at our church the pastor spoke on expectations of
Christmas, and how our expectations often do not match with our reality.
Which made me think, what would Mary have been expecting when she went
to Bethlehem? Consider this…the girl had had angels come to tell her she was pregnant. Now that is a long long way from peeing on a stick.
Angels!
She
knew she was chosen. Being that she was Mary and not Missy, she did not
get arrogant about it, nor proud – she remained humble, as we see in
her
Magnificat.
The Gospels do not tell us what her pregnancy was like (a sure sign
that they were written by men. Imagine if God had chosen a woman to
write a Gospel – how many chapters would have outlined her morning
sickness and labor?) I assume Mary threw up like the rest of us and woke
up every hour to tee tee and had backaches and embarrassing gas
moments.
Some church traditions
teach that Mary did not suffer in childbirth – but aside from
disagreeing with that theology, I don’t even like that idea. The thought
of Mary having sciatica makes me love her so much more. Anyway,
she knows she is carrying the Savior of the world in her womb. She
knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that the baby who has been kicking her
all night long for months now is going to bring peace to all mankind. She knows this. That angel had told her. And being that she was human, I would imagine she had some – expectations.
As
her contractions increased and she walked the long road to Bethlehem
feeling, like all women do at 9 months gestation, like a big fat cow, I
doubt Mary was expecting a gilded room at the palace (I am sure the
thought would have crossed my mind, but as I mentioned previously, I am
no Mary). However I feel pretty sure that she was expecting God to provide her with at the very least, a room
- a private, warm, reasonably clean room to deliver this precious
child. Such a small request! She had earned at least as much – suffering
through the societal stigma of an unplanned pregnancy, and almost
losing Joseph – surely God would make it up to her in childbirth. *
I bet the last thing that Mary expected from God was a stable.
I have birthed four babies myself; I just cannot imagine giving birth in a barn. Non-Mary
I, in the third stage of labor, would have had some tacky things to say
about this particular arrangement. What must have gone through her and
Joseph’s minds? The Messiah, the Prince of Peace, the Mighty One, is coming into the world in a barn? Surrounded
by animals and manure? Imagine how protective we are of our brand new
babies – and imagine lying one to rest in a manger that cows eat out of?? Hardly sterile.
Do
you think they wondered if they had gotten the message wrong? Did they
ask if this was some holy joke? While she was pushing our pure and
stainless Lord into the world onto hay and dirt, did Mary keep waiting
for someone to rescue her?
Mary
had been obedient, she had prayed unceasingly, she was the ultimate
woman of God, yet in her time of great need, doors were repeatedly
slammed in her face, literally. I think she must have been very confused
in that stable.
I know so many people who are in a stable right now.
Many of my dear friends are amazing women of God. They
pray, they fast, they are so obedient. Some of them even do their quiet
time every single morning. They are much, much godlier than I am. They
are doing everything “right”.
Yet, we have
cried together over this last year. Things are not going the way they
planned. Several are exhausted with grief. Others' empty arms are aching
to hold a baby. One's son has seizures and no one knows why. Some are
in unhappy marriages or going through divorce. And my heart is
especially burdened for a few girlfriends who are in their 30s, strongly
desiring marriage and children, but God has yet to call them to this.
This
life is not the way it was supposed to go, not what they signed up for.
It’s not what they thought they were promised. This life right now is
definitely not what they expected. And they, like perhaps Mary was, are so confused.
We
have the blessing of hindsight to know that the stable was
representative of a very different kind of messiah. A humble messiah,
with a message of peace, not the military hero the Jews were expecting
(there is that word again.) A messiah who hung out not with kings but
with the dregs of society, beginning with the shepherds who were his
first visitors. “Not the righteous; sinners Jesus came to call.”
By
ordaining such a humble birthplace, God sent a message from the very
beginning that this baby was going to rock everyone’s expectations, and
shake their world view, and cause them to question everything they
thought they knew. God does nothing haphazardly.
There was a purpose in the stable. There was something bigger going on
than Mary or Joseph – righteous, yet mere humans - could see or grasp.
I submit that there are purposes in our stables as well.
Usually
we cannot see the reason for the stable when we are in it. Sometimes,
God clues us in later, and when it happens that is a real treat. But we
don’t always get the blessing of knowledge. In fact frequently God in his infinite wisdom does not clue us in. I
don’t know why the desires of my sweet friends’ hearts are not being
met. I don’t know why Christian marriages fail, I don’t know why babies
die, and I don’t know why my friends who would make such wonderful
mothers can’t get pregnant. I don’t expect to find out this side of
paradise, and there is no biblical promise that it will be revealed to
me even in Heaven. I only know this – that God is sovereign and God is good.
There
have been times in my life when “God is sovereign” has been a mantra I
screamed repeatedly inside my brain. And there have been times when I
just got depressed and wondered when I was ever going to get out of this
dumb stable. But (praise Him) our responses and
our feelings and our confusion and even our bitterness regarding these
stables do not change the fact that God is sovereign, and God is good.
And that He is up to more than we can see, that His grand design is
greater than our own expectations, however noble they may be – which
means, without a doubt, there is a purpose for the stable. God is intimately, unceasingly, invasively, personally involved in every aspect of our lives.
At some point, on earth or in Heaven, we will praise Him for the stable, because He loves you and me as much as he loved Mary – take a moment and grasp that – and He has as much reason and purpose for putting us in our particular stable as he did Mary and baby Jesus. And this should give us hope – And
hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into
our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us. (Romans 5:5)
Merry Christmas.
*
A noted biblical archaeologist whom I greatly admire, Jim Fleming,
believes that Mary would have had other women in her family around her –
they would have all been in Bethlehem as well, so of course they would
have attended her birth. When I first heard that Mary did not deliver
Jesus with only Joseph for company (whom, remember, Matthew 1:25 says
she had had no sexual relations with as yet – and childbirth is a great
get-to-know-you party) that brought me immense comfort. God most likely
provided Mary with the comfort of other women in her time of need - just
as He does for us today.
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