1) You're never really sure if that's Joseph or just another shepherd.
2) They all over-romanticize what happened that night and all that led up that night.
We like our Bethlehem to be quaint and quiet. We like our Mary to be clean and perhaps glowing. We like our Joseph to be standing off to the side. We like our stable to be a scene out of Better Homes and Gardens. But the reality is, none of that was the case...and that is VERY important to you and me!
First, why Bethlehem? Was it the largest city? Not even close. Did they have the best medical care...God would want His Son to be born in that type of environment, right? No. The only reason that Jesus was to be born in Bethlehem was because God wanted Him to be born in Bethlehem. Micah 5:2 says: "But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for Me One who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from of old, from ancient days." When God refers to Bethlehem as "Bethlehem Ephrathah," as any kid knows when his/her mom goes first and middle name, something serious is up! Also, note that God points out the fact that no one really sees anything special about Bethlehem. If all the towns in Israel were to play kickball, Bethlehem would be the last one picked...she was an underdog. That is how God works! He chooses to use the underdogs to accomplish great things so that He receives the most glory. Great hope for us bunch of underdogs!
It would be amazing enough for God to use Micah to prophesy the coming Messiah to be born in Bethlehem and just fast forward to Luke 2 and see its fulfillment...but by doing so, we rob ourselves of an incredibly valuable lesson: the historical journey. Luke 2 says,
"In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria. And all went to be registered, each to his own town. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and linage of David, to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child. And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth. 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."
There is a 700 year span of time between Micah 5:2 and Luke 2:1-7. When Micah was on the scene, the Assyrian Empire ruled much of the known world. Somewhere between 612 BC and 626 BC, it was the Babylonians that rose to the top of the proverbial food chain. As empires do, the Babylonians rose and then fell leaving the known world to the Medo-Persians for about 200 years. Then in 330 BC, a young military ruler named Alexander the Great rose to prominence and led the Greek Empire to unprecedented domination. In 63 BC, the Greeks were replaced by the Romans. In 44 BC, Julius Caesar was assassinated on the Roman Senate floor ("et tu Brute") leaving control of Rome to his adopted nephew, Octavius. Octavius joined with Marcus Lepidus and Mark Antony (famed lover of Cleopatra, not Jennifer Lopez's former boo and present purveyor of his very own clothing line at Kohl's department stores...that's Mark Anthony) to split control of the Roman Empire and form the Second Triumvirate. Octavius decided he no longer wanted to share, so he forced Marcus Lepidus into exile and defeated Mark Antony at the Battle of Actium in 31 BC to become the sole ruler and essentially the first first emperor of the Roman Empire. From then forth, Octavius was known as Octavius Caesar Augustus...the same Caesar Augustus that issued the decree for a census in Luke 2.
You may be asking, what in the world does any of this have to do with me personally? Everything! You see, just as God delivered a promise through Micah about the birthplace of the Messiah, He has given us promises to cling to and hold on to throughout His Word. And just as there was a temptation to believe that God had forgotten His promise through Micah because so much history had passed since that revelation, there is a strong temptation for us to wonder if God has forgotten His promises to us. But, just as God perfectly set the stage through the historical circumstances to fulfill His Word, He has and is perfectly setting the stage in our lives to bring about the fulfillment of His promises. God uses the roads that we travel to masterfully craft an amazingly beautiful mosaic of His love for us!
If we just causally observe the nativity without close examination, there is a second incredibly valuable lesson that we miss: the emotional journey.
Again Luke 2:1-7 says,
"In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria. And all went to be registered, each to his own town. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and linage of David, to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child. And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth. 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."
Every time we refer to the ensemble of the nativity as "The Holy Family," we strip a lot away from the reality of the situation that took place over 2000 years ago. The pregnancy of Mary was scandalous to say the least...a young unmarried woman claiming to conceive by the Holy Spirit of God Himself. The reputation of Joseph digressed into a punchline...the naiveté of this man actually believing Mary. With their public perception being less less than stellar, at least Mary had the comforts of her home and her family and her doctor to rely on...until Joseph announced that the two on them had to travel 70-80 miles to Bethlehem...in the later weeks of her pregnancy. What fears must have consumed the mind of Mary! What anxiety must have filled the heart of Joseph! Along their journey, how many times do you think Mary and Joseph calmed one another with the words, "But when we get to Bethlehem..."? What concern rushed over them when they saw the crowds streaming into Bethlehem? How many times do you think Joseph tried to assure Mary that when people see her late-term pregnancy, they will decently put her ahead of themselves and allow her the comfort and privacy of a room and bed? How deflated do you think they were when they were turned away from the inn (nothing but a series of stalls where guests built fires and cooked the food they had brought with them), and every time Joseph came back from following a hunch to deliver the same message to rejection to his distraught wife? So they ended up settling where all the people in the inn tied their animals up for the night. And it was probably there, where Mary felt her first hard and steady contractions. This was not at all how they had planned for the birth to take place. So, now Joseph, with his rough and calloused hands of a carpenter, was expected to deliver a baby...and not just a baby, but the very Son of God come to earth. What must have been going through the minds of Mary and Joseph through the agonies of childbirth? And then, the rough and calloused carpenter hands held the newborn baby boy! The baby's shrill cry pierced the night and through that cry, God pierced the 400 years of silence between His last word in Malachi and the fulfillment of Emmanuel: "God with us."
All of us have wounds and scars from our past...but wounds and scars are evidence of God's healing! All of us have had fears, worries, anxieties, and deflated hopes and dreams...but God meets all of those things head-on with His love. And His love conquers! Through it ALL, God's love is there and is made known. We may not have chosen the path that we are currently walking. We may not have chosen the circumstances that we find ourselves in. But in our journey, God's love is there!
I love the nativity...because it reminds me of how God uses my underdog status, my history, and my difficult treks to pierce the darkness of hopelessness and usher me into the radiance of knowing without any hesitation or doubt that God loves me.
