Still No Room?

Thanksgiving Day is over.

The dishes are put away.

Now it is December,

And Christmas deadlines loom.

The leaves have finished falling;

Gutters need to be cleaned.

Traffic is appalling;

Cars on the highway zoom.

Blue lights now are flashing;

Drug busts here and there.

In war, the bombs still crashing;

Newscasters chattering doom.

People are all out shopping

Driven by endless lists.

The adrenaline isn’t stopping;

Homes sit empty with gloom.

The world shouts its expectations;

Consumers follow blindly,

Going through the motions

While our hearts are like a tomb.

“More and many” is the call

Demanded by the world.

No value for the hidden and small

Like Mary’s sacred womb.

We go along and put our lot in,

Gambling on store-bought promises,

And seem to have forgotten

That stillness makes peace bloom.

And as we come to Christmas Eve,

Will all our strivings truly cease?

And will we just believe?

Or, will Jesus come to us tonight

And find there’s still no room?

Devotional Reflections

Recently during this Christmas season, after a very busy day of errands, homeschooling, and gift-wrapping, I felt like a worn out dishrag by nightfall. I sat in my mostly-dark living room by myself, and in the quiet, a disturbing thought came to me: 

There is still no room for Jesus at Christmastime. 

We all get caught up in that worldly pattern in December - the cyclone of shopping, buying, wrapping, planning, food-preparing, coordinating, attending, and managing. The frenzy of consumerism, more things, and many events  - all of these squeeze out the stillness, and consequently, all the room in one’s spirit - room where Jesus and his peace would have sat quietly with each of us, reminding us that he came in the form of something small and poor, naked and simple. 

Like the baby Jesus, we need to strip down to the rags, feel the uncomfortable prickle of hay, and allow God’s love to swaddle us in a warm embrace. Feeling the splintered wood of the rough-hewn manger, warmed by the body heat of simple faithful animals, gazing at the stars glittering in a velvet black sky - these are enough for us. 

God is enough. 

Let’s not just clear out a small corner of our hearts. Let Jesus have the whole room. 

He is all that matters.

By Heather J. Willis, author