Friday, December 2, 2016

Journey to Bethlehem

Luke 2:4-5

So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David.  He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child.

As I was reading through this account, I started thinking about my last pregnancy.  Around this time, four years ago, I was seven months pregnant with my first born son.  Now not all pregnancies are rough, but mine with my son was horrible and by seven months, I was so huge, I felt like I could hardly move some days. 

Here was Mary, who was clearly very pregnant.  Even with the best of pregnancies, I just cannot imagine what she had to go through, traveling all the way from Nazareth to Bethlehem.  Most doctors today would advise you against such travel in your third trimester. 

Over the next couple of weeks, I want to take simple passages, such as this, and help us to visualize being in the situation.  While not all of you can relate to Mary in her pregnancy, I’m sure you’ve all known women at the end of their pregnancy and just how miserable they get. 

As you get to the very end, they tell you to go walk the mall or something like that.  Mary sure did a lot of walking at the end of her pregnancy!

Now for you guys that have had a pregnant wife or friend and have been around toward the end, I’m sure you can only imagine what Joseph was going through.  He needed to go to register, needed to take Mary with him as she was pledged to be his wife, and here she was probably miserable throughout the trip.  He was probably slowed down because of her pregnancy and probably felt helpless in taking care of her. 

I know that my husband often felt this same way when I couldn’t move very quickly and would complain about something that he really couldn’t fix. 


Today I hope you can simply imagine what that journey would have been like for Mary and Joseph.

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