Preoccupied or Prepared?

clip

The long-awaited Life was about to burst into human history. An entire nation had been watching and waiting for this Life. Yet strangely, most were not prepared to receive the Life when He finally came.

A few were prepared.

God’s angel paid a visit to a teenaged girl. When he told her that she was the chosen woman who would give birth to that Life, she was ready. She did not understand how it could happen. She did not comprehend why God would choose her. But her heart was prepared to receive and nurture that Life in her womb.

A humble carpenter was working toward the day when he and his bride would be joined in marriage. He too was among those awaiting the coming of the Life. When he first knew that his promised bride was expecting a child, he couldn’t comprehend what was happening. God’s angel visited him as well. Through a dream, this one was also prepared to play his part in nurturing, protecting, and being an earthly father to the Promised One.

Others were preoccupied.

Along with a host of other travelers, these two who were prepared approached the town of Bethlehem. It had been a long journey. They were dusty and travel-weary. They knew that the time was near for the Life to be brought into the world.

As they searched for a place to spend the night – a place for the Holy birth to take place – they found nothing. No room for the Long-Awaited One.

Most had no clue that He would come as a tiny baby born to a teenaged mother with a humble carpenter for a father. Had the imminent arrival of this Life been announced ahead of time with a trumpet fanfare, no doubt many would have made preparations for Him.

But the Life that approached Bethlehem came quietly. The busy, harried population of Bethlehem was preoccupied with the crowds that had descended on their town. They had no time for a young, weary pregnant woman or her child that would soon be born.

So the Life came quietly, humbly. Born in a stable. A feeding trough for animals was His first bed. The Life had come. Most were not prepared.

Are we any better prepared?

clip

We do not await the birth of the Long-Awaited One in the same way the carpenter and his teenaged wife did. But in this Advent season, perhaps we need to ask ourselves an important question. “Are we prepared to take into our hearts the fullness of that Life Whose birth we celebrate?”

Oh yes, we may believe that He came. We know why He came. We can say all the right things.

But are our hearts prepared to hear that still, small whisper of Life. Are we ready to allow that Life to permeate the deepest recesses of our hearts and bring His life into dry places. 

Are we prepared to receive the healing and restoration that only that Life can bring?

Or are we, like the townspeople of Bethlehem, too busy with the busy-ness of our lives to even notice that the Life is right there at our hearts’ door, ready to come in and work His wonders?

Are we preoccupied? …Or are we prepared?