It is almost impossible to drive the seven short miles between Jerusalem and Bethlehem without looking for scenes of Christmas. From the ridge along which the road has wound for thousands of years one looks eastward across the deep valleys where shepherds grazed their flocks that eventful night. Today one sees concrete structures — apartment buildings, a snaking security wall dividing Israel from the West Bank and tall towers holding electric lines.
It takes a vivid imagination to see well-worn paths made by sheep and goats as they crisscrossed the hillsides 2,000 years ago searching for new-grown grass. But if you try really hard you can almost see the flocks along the steep ridges that fall off toward the Jordan River Valley.
This time of year the animals move at a leisurely pace. The dry season has passed. October’s rains caused the land to sprout with small yellow and blue flowers and nourishing green grass. The sheep don’t have to worry about getting enough to eat until April, when the six-month dry season begins all over again.
Rock outcroppings are everywhere. The land is honeycombed with caves. Once these caves served as homes for Israelites as well as for their animals. Shepherds drove their flocks into these sheep pens at night to keep them safe from predators. Remember the story of the good shepherd in Luke 15?
Across the mouth of the cave a shepherd dragged a makeshift fence plaited together from branches from thorn trees. These were the same kind of thorns made into the crown placed on Jesus’ head the day He died. But this night, the night He is to be born, the thorns help guard the shepherds’ flocks.
Once the fires died out the shepherd would join his flock in the cave. He slept in the mouth of the cave between the thorn fence and the sheep. Anything that went after the sheep would have to go through him first.
It was like that in the typical peasant home of that day, too. Most family members slept in the same room. The father, the strong man of the house, slept by the door as a way of protecting his family. Remember Jesus’ words about first having to bind the strong man before being able to break into a home in Mark 3:27?
Good shepherds protected their sheep the same way fathers protected their families.
More than one church claims to be the actual place where the shepherds of Christmas watched over their flocks, but no one knows for sure. At the site preserved by Roman Catholics one can step inside a rather large cave carved out of blackish rock. The cave could have held more than a hundred sheep easily. The small entrance is just the type shepherds would have wanted, and thorn trees still grow nearby. Stopping here to reflect
on the shepherds, it is easy to be transported across time and almost see the shepherds tending their animals or sitting around a campfire enjoying a night like a thousand others. But this night, Christmas night, would be eternally different.
In Bethlehem the cave where the innkeeper kept the animals is almost gone. A Greek Orthodox church has stood atop the site almost continuously for 1,700 years. Pictures of the wise men from the East painted above the door of the first church confused the Persians when they captured Bethlehem in 614 AD, so they did not destroy the edifice.
The cave where many believe Jesus was born sits under the altar of the church. One descends a few steps from the right side, if facing the altar, only to find oneself surrounded by marble, fine tapestries, gold inlay and other precious stones. Most who come to this site kneel before a hollowed-out stone that once served as a feeding trough for animals. It is the manger where the Bible says Mary and Joseph laid their newborn Son the night He was born. If it is not the same manger, it is like the one that served as baby Jesus’ first bed.
Amid the flash of tourists’ cameras and a line of people waiting to get in, people kneel and pray and thank God for redemption. It is Christmas. In the place where God took on human form, one remembers and gives thanks.
Prayers have to be quick, however, because a priest tries to keep the line moving and will soon point one toward the stairs exiting to the left of the altar.
For some the aroma of incense, the burning candles and all the royal finery make it difficult to find spiritual satisfaction in the Church of the Nativity. They would prefer an earthen floor, a chipped trough and even the smell of animals.
Many want time to stand still, for hillsides to be dotted with sheep instead of apartments, to see shepherds rather than soldiers, to witness the brightness of a never-before-seen star instead of the burst of an exploding rocket. We would like to travel in time and look in on the holy family in that cave and see Jesus lying in a manger.
But Christmas is not seen in romanticized snapshots of the past. Christmas is seen today. It does not matter if baby Jesus is lying in a hollowed-out rock or a wooden trough or in the bed of a Radio Flyer wagon; Christmas is seen in the miraculous moment when one recognizes the love of God reaching toward humankind in the birth of Jesus.
“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.” This time of the year, look for Christmas. Look for God’s love.
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