(To help Japanese tsunami victims, click link after Morning Devotion).
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I’m not sure why this thought hasn’t crossed my mind before, but I’m glad it did today.
I’m talking about the Luke 2 reference to Joseph and Mary using a hay manger as a crib for the newborn Messiah rather than having a room at the Bethlehem Inn.
What intrigued me today after I read Luke 2 was the fact that none of the people staying at the inn volunteered to give up their room so that a young lady about to go into labor would have a decent place to prepare for and experience the delivery.
Did anybody at the inn, other than the innkeeper, know that Joseph and Mary desperately needed a room?
Did the innkeeper not want to anger tenants who might not have wanted to hear the sometimes-pained cries of a woman in childbirth? Particularly in those days before anesthesia?
If some staying at the inn did know of Joseph’s and Mary’s situation, would it have made any difference?
What if you had rented the last room at the inn after an exhausting, three-day trip? Would you have given up the room to make way for this young, pregnant couple?
Would you have slept with the cows and donkeys in a drafty stable rather than in a bed with a nearby firepot to keep you warm?
I want to think that you and I would have willingly done so, but we can’t know for certain we’d have done so.
If we were to see a traveling salesman refuse to give up the motel room he’d just rented so that a young, pregnant couple didn’t have to sleep in their car, we’d probably form an unfavorable opinion about the salesman.
But lest we become judgmental, are there young, struggling parents we know who are desperately needing our sacrificial help?
We probably won’t encounter the need to give up a motel room to accommodate the couple, but our willingness to give up eating out for lunch for a month could mean $100 for gas expense to get to church for the next four months. You know how Satan’s whispers are SO persuasive when money is extremely tight…
“Oh, you can’t afford to go to church. Gas is just too expensive and you don’t have the money. Just stay home and have church with yourself,” is what the Enemy might say.
You see, he knows that young parent couples who attend church each week are far more likely to raise up children who grow into faithful believers.
Please don’t allow Satan to have more influence than you. If you don’t know such a couple but still want to help refute Satan’s lies, talk to your pastor. He’ll know some young couple who could benefit from your active, tangible compassion.
However the Holy Spirit stirs your heart, please make sure to follow His leading.
For if God is stirring you to help the young couple — or even tsunami victims in Japan — you’ll make a HUGE mistake if you don’t respond appropriately.
“If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn’t do it, it is sin for them” (James 4:17).
As always, I love you
Martin
If you’d like to donate to a Japanese congregation that will be using 100 percent of the money for victim relief, please click this link with confidence.
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