No VIP Required: The Story of the King of the Stable

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The King of the Stable

 

The Judean hills were quiet under a vast, star-dusted sky. It was a mild night, likely spring, and the air smelled of dry earth and sage. Elias sat on the rocky ground, listening to the soft bleating of the flock.

 

Elias was a shepherd. In the social hierarchy of the day, that put him somewhere just above the livestock he guarded. He was a man acquainted with dust, far removed from the polished cobblestones of Jerusalem or the perfumed courts of Rome. He knew his place in the world: on the outside, looking in.

 

Like everyone else, Elias had heard the whispers and prophecies about a coming King, a Messiah. In his mind, this arrival would be marked by blazing chariots and golden trumpets. The King would be born amidst silk and servants, inaccessible behind high palace walls. God’s Kingdom, Elias assumed, was for the important people.

 

Then the sky ripped open over the hillsides.

 

The glory of that light was matched only by the confusion of the message. The angel didn’t direct them to a palace. He sent them to the overly crowded, noisy town of Bethlehem, which was currently bursting at the seams with travelers arriving for the census.

 

Why us? Elias wondered as his group hurried down the path. Why tell the shepherds?

 

They found the spot behind a guest house that had no room left. It wasn't a picturesque wooden barn; it was a limestone cave used to shelter animals, smelling intensely of livestock and feed.

 

Elias hesitated at the entrance. He was dusty from the fields. He wasn't worthy to enter a decent home, let alone the birthplace of a King.

But as his eyes adjusted to the dim lantern light, he saw a young couple, exhausted from travel. And there, in the center of the room, was the sign the angel promised.

 

The baby was not lying in a gilded crib. He was resting in a stone feeding trough...a manger...wrapped in the common strips of cloth used by the poor.

 

Elias stepped closer. The King of Kings was sleeping in the exact type of rough stone trough Elias filled with grain every morning for his animals.

 

In that moment, the mild night air seemed to hold its breath. Standing in that simple cave, Elias realized something that changed everything.

If God had wanted only the elite, He would have chosen a palace in Rome. If He wanted only the religious scholars, He would have chosen the Temple in Jerusalem.

 

But by choosing a feeding trough in a borrowed cave, God was shouting a different message to the world. He was declaring that His arrival wasn't just for the royalty who could afford gold, but for the shepherds who only had wool.

 

The gate to God's Kingdom wasn’t a heavy, guarded door. It was as open and accessible as a cave on a hillside.

 

Elias left that night smelling no better than when he arrived. He was still a shepherd. But as he walked back up the hill under the spring stars, he knew that for the first time in his life, he was not on the outside looking in. He had been invited to the banquet table.

 

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A Note for This Christmas:

 

It’s easy to feel disqualified during the holidays. We feel we aren't prosperous enough, "together" enough, or holy enough.

 

But the nativity story reminds us that the gift of Jesus wasn't placed on a high shelf where only the spiritual giants could reach it. It was placed in a feeding trough, on the ground floor, accessible to anyone willing to bend their knee.

 

Merry Christmas. The invitation for  salvation is for you. Will you accept His gift?