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You never know when God might be up to something.
He's a curious one, and rather difficult to anticipate.
Make no mistake, he loves to surprise.
But then, if I want my God to be something more than a better version of me, he will do things--and do them in a way--that I'd never imagine.
But I do like to imagine what might have been happening in Jerusalem the night Jesus was born.
God was up to something. But not in the Holy City.
I imagine, that night in Jerusalem, King Herod--or, Herod the Great--as he was affectionately wont to be called, might have been hosting an elegant--read, decadent--dinner party at his place. Everybody who was anybody, and anybody who longed to be somebody, was there that night. And nobody was left out, if you know what I mean. Dealing. Positioning. Smirking. The Romans were privately making fun of the Jews. The Jews were privately mocking the Romans. King Herod was likely making fools of them all.
Six miles away--yes, just six miles, but a world away in the small town of Bethlehem--God was up to something.
There in an outer court of a gracious innkeeper, the King of Kings was nursing at his mother's breast. Though a newborn, he was an old soul. A very old soul:
But as for you, Bethlehem Ephrathah,
Too little to be among the clans of Judah,
From you One will go forth for Me to be ruler in Israel.
His goings forth are from long ago,
From the days of eternity (Micah 5:2).
With the benefit of hindsight, we might recognize the clues; but there is nothing in the Law or the Prophets that would have anticipated, or perhaps even allowed, what God would do through the child of Bethlehem. Who would have imagined that night that the course of history would be shaped, not by the elite at Herod's soiree, but by the boy in the manger, six miles away.
I'd encourage you in these rather tumultuous times, don't overestimate the powerful among men and don't underestimate what God can do through the most humble. And when you feel discouraged around the course that this world--or your life--is taking...
Make no mistake, he loves to surprise.
He's a curious one, and rather difficult to anticipate.
You never know when God might be up to something.
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