away in a manger - the day after

We sing the songs about Jesus' birth in a sheep pen. We idealize it and we set up likenesses of our version of the scene and call it 'the nativity'.

yet I believe we have sterilized it so much that we miss a couple things... I know I do.

What was it like after the gift-bearing royalty left? Do we think that the inn-keeper suddenly found a room for the new parents and their new baby?

Jesus whole life was, in a way, miraculous. We think of His birth that way... but have you ever thought of the days following our baby savior's arrival?

What was it like for a teenage momma to care for her new baby in a barn? Nursing and diapering (did they even have diapers? yeccchh!) and sleeping and not sleeping...

When we welcomed our firstborn to this world, I couldn't even get within 10 feet of her without a 5 minute surgical scrub and a face mask. When we brought her home, we had so thoroughly disinfected our house, it would have passed any Marine's white glove inspection! Bacteria feared our house for over a year!

We are so accustomed to the sterilized environment to which we usher our babies.... and I wonder what it must have been like for Mary and Joseph.

For me the whole thing was a miracle.... His conception and birth and, yes, merely surviving His first few days here... not in a pristine, germ-free neonatal intensive care unit with nurses buzzing around checking His temperature and wiping Him down with alcohol swabs... but in a barn with donkeys licking His face...

thank God for His Sovereign plan which seems more stunning to me everyday.

Blessings!