Away in a Manger, Carols week 5

Carols- Wk 5

Away in a Manger

Series Slide

Merry Christmas! What an amazing day to worship the Lord, I hope you all fared the storms well, we’ve got a week of clear weather ahead as we look into the new year! And, I don’t want to forget to say, welcome to those of you worshiping from home or across the world as you join us online. I am honored to worship with you on this, the first Sunday of Christmas. Remember, we were in Advent… Christmas didn’t start until Christmas Day, and so, now we are in our first Sunday of Christmas, but our 5th Sunday of looking at these carols of Christmas that have been such a part of our lives.

I love looking at the history and meaning of some of the best-loved songs of Christmas. Today, we are looking at one of everyone’s favorite Christmas Carols… “Away In a Manger.” I would have done it sooner, but I just couldn’t talk about Jesus in the manger until after Christmas! But here we are… Jesus is born, the King has arrived.

So, as we get started, I would like to invite you into a moment of prayer:

[Prayer]

Away in a Manger

Now, for the background. For the first 50 years of the life of this carol, legend was that Martin Luther, the great church reformer of the 1500’s wrote this song for his own children.

One of the earliest copies of this hymn was found in 1882 in the Children’s Corner of a publication, calling it Luther’s Cradle Song, attributing the song to Luther, and claiming “German Mothers were still singing the song to their children.” The problem, German mothers wouldn’t hear of the song for another 50 years. The first German text of this carol wasn’t found to be published until 1934.

So, how did it become a song attributed to Martin Luther? Well, in 1945, Richard Hill did a comprehensive study of the song and determined that one possibility was that it was written for an 1883 children’s Christmas production and a part of the 400th anniversary of the birth of Martin Luther, showing how Luther may have celebrated Christmas with his family.

The truth is, we will likely never know the actual origin of this great song, but what we do know is that it has brought hope, peace, joy, and love to the hearts of families for generations. It tells a story so simple a child can understand it, yet so profound it can change a life.

So, let’s take a little time to consider this story. To start, we just heard the scripture it is partially derived from, that great passage from Luke 2 talking about the angels sharing the news of Jesus birth with the shepherds, ending with their song:

“Glory to God in the highest heaven,

and on earth peace among those whom he favors!”

Imagine with me, what that night must have been like…The shepherds have gathered in the field…

<Shepherds Field>

They are watching after their sheep, keeping them safe from wild dogs and predators. They are prepared for anything, taking shifts to watch and wait. Here these men are… some standing in the opening to the caves. Some standing in the field, propped on their staff. Some sleeping under the stars or tucked away in the crevasse of a cave.

<Shepherds in field at night>

Maybe there is a fire burning for warmth as the pungent smell of burnt wood and damp wool fills the air. It is quiet, save the bleating of sheep and the crackling of the fire.

Then, from nowhere an angel appears in the sky. And then another, and another. One speaks and proclaims, “Don’t be afraid”…. Yeah Right! Then they proclaim that the Christ has been born, not only born, but born only a short walk from where they are. Suddenly, what was once a few angels become a sky full of angels, praising God. Some of us have been where this likely happened outside of Bethlehem. I can see in my mind where it happened. But I cannot imagine what it was actually like!

Thousands of angels showing up… proclaiming the Savior’s birth.

The Shepherds went and found the baby, just as the angel had said.

The Little Lord Jesus Asleep On the Hay

Or as Luke described it,

Luke 2:6-7

While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.

Very little is actually written about the birth of Jesus. Our stories and legends have grown and grown from the little writing and the vast oral history that has lived on. Here is what we know… this was not an easy travel. From Nazareth to Bethlehem is some 70 miles through the uneven terrain of the Judean Desert.

<Jordan Valley>

Tradition tells us that Mary traveled by donkey but we really don’t know for sure… the biblical account doesn’t tell us, but either way, 70 miles walking or 70 miles on the back of a donkey. I cannot imagine how tired they would have been.

Another thing we do not know is if they arrived at night… or if she was going into labor as they looked for a place to stay. What we know is that there was no room in the guest house where they were to stay and they stayed where there would be a manger.

And it is here that she gave birth.

Since around 120 AD, the story has circulated that it was a cave that was used as a barn for a home. There would have been two entrances, one through the home and one to the outside. Sometime in the 4th Century, Queen Helena, the mother of Emperor Constantine traveled to the Holy Lands looking for the birthplace of Jesus. She was shown the site that is now known as The Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem.

When she arrived there was no shrine, there was no Byzantine church. There was simply a cave, marked by some as a place of worship.

<Bethlehem Church of the Nativity Cave>

Today it is tiled and the sides are covered. The Grotto is said to be where Mary birthed Jesus and their blood spilled onto the ground during the birth. It’s hard to see what it must have been like on that night some 2000 years ago

The image of a mother and father, lying in a cave after days of journeying, and then giving birth to a child, once stuck in our head, can never leave.

<Exhausted Mary Joseph and Baby Jesus>

I have never found an actual image that depicts all of this, so I created one from two images. One that shows the exhaustion and reality of the life that is faced, raising not only a son, but the Lord. The other, a cave used as a barn. Together, it portrays to me what it may have been like that night when the Little Lord Jesus was first asleep on the hay.

Ultimately, the legend of crèches and cradles and cute animals and angels and wise men at the birth are all stripped away and what we are left with is a mother and father like any other, looking upon the beauty of a baby and wondering how in the world they are going to do it.

That is the beauty of that moment… it is a moment that any parent, grandparent, aunt, uncle, niece, nephew, brother or sister can comprehend. It is a moment of intense pride and a moment of overwhelming fear. It is joy and exhaustion. For Mary and Joseph, it is both a peace beyond understanding and a realization of the very presence of God in the world.

Away in a Manger

I do not know how a person can look upon an infant and not be filled with love… yet I could never fully understand what it must be like to look down at the child of your womb and see the Creator of the Universe within the child you just birthed. That is a love beyond comprehension.

It is a love we can dream of… but it is also a love we should strive for. The author of Away in a Manger invited us to sing the words:

I Love Thee, Lord Jesus…

If we are to do anything in this life, we are to love our Lord, Jesus.

When Jesus was once asked about the greatest commandment

Matthew 22:37-39

He said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’

What does that mean? I know it is easy to talk about Loving a baby you hold in your arms, or loving a wife, or loving Lasagna or Haagen-Dazs Ice Cream… But to love the Lord our God… how do you do that?

First, we love because he first loved us. We love because God loved us enough to leave the holiness of heaven for the humility of humanity. We love because God loved us enough to come to live among us, to do life with us, to teach us to live and to love… then he showed us the ultimate example of love when he died on a cross as an innocent man convicted of crimes against the very essence of the God that he is. We love God, because God didn’t stay in the grave, but then rose again, overcoming the power of sin and death, that you and I could not. That is why we love… because he first loved us.

How we love is by doing the very things that God called us to do. We love God when we study Scripture and share in worship. We love God when we feed the hungry, clothe the naked, or give a drink to the thirsty. We love God when we love all of God’s creation. And it is a love we are not capable of on our own.

That is the beauty of the next lines in this Carol…

Be near me, Lord Jesus

That is the answer to what it means to love and be loved. That is the answer to how it is that we love when we ourselves don’t feel loved. That is the answer to how we love those that others may consider unlovable.

The Psalmist wrote:

Psalm 63:1

O God, you are my God, I seek you,

my soul thirsts for you;

my flesh faints for you,

as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.

That is the way we need to look toward God. That is the way we need to seek the Lord… My whole being thirsts for you… My body desires you… That is what we should cry… be near me Lord, Jesus.

Away in a Manger

And, as we prepare to enter into a new year, we know that we do not do it alone. We can cry, “Be near me Lord, Jesus” knowing that he already is… He is Emmanuel… God with us.

May this be a year that we love the Lord our God… may it be a year that we serve the Lord out of that love that he has shared with us… May it be a year that we seek the Lord and thirst for the Lord in a new way.

I hope and I pray that this year will be a year that we experience a fresh outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon this church and upon each of us as God is near us, looking over all of us in His tender care, and fit us for heaven to live with Him there.