Augustus was sitting on the throne of the Roman empire, and the touch of his finger could set the machinery of government in motion over well-nigh the whole of the civilized world. He was proud of his power and wealth, and it was one of his favorite occupations to compile a register of the populations and revenues of his vast dominions. So he issued an edict, as the Evangelist Luke says, “that all the world should be taxed,” or, to express accurately what the words probably mean, that a census, to serve as a basis for future taxation, should be taken of all his subjects.
One of the countries affected by this decree was Palestine, whose king, Herod the Great, was a vassal of Augustus. It set the whole land in motion, for the census was taken, not in the places where the inhabitants were currently residing, but their ancestral homes to which they belonged as members of the original twelve tribes.
Among those whom the edict of Augustus from afar drove forth to the highways were a humble pair in the Galilean village of Nazareth—Joseph the carpenter of the village, and Mary, his espoused wife. They had to take a journey of nearly a hundred miles in order to inscribe themselves in the proper register. For though peasants, they had the blood of kings in their veins, and belonged to the ancient and royal town of Bethlehem in Judea.
Day by day the emperor’s will, like an invisible hand, forced them southward along the weary road, until at last they climbed the rocky ascent that led to the gate of the town—he terrified with anxiety, and she well-nigh dead with fatigue. They reached the inn, but found it crowded with strangers, who, bent on the same errand as themselves, had arrived before them. No friendly house opened the door to receive them, and they were forced to claim for their lodging a corner of the inn-yard, otherwise occupied by the beasts of the numerous travellers.
There, that very night, she brought forth her firstborn Son; and because there was neither womanly hand to assist, nor couch to receive Him, she wrapped Him in swaddling clothes and laid Him in a manger.
Such was the manner of the birth of Jesus. I never felt the full pathos of the scene until standing one day in a room of an old inn in the market town of Eisleben, in Central Germany. I was told that on that very spot, four centuries ago, amid the noise of a market day and the bustle of a public house, the wife of the poor miner, Hans Luther, who happened to be there on business, being surprised like Mary with sudden distress, brought forth in sorrow and poverty the child who was to become the hero of the Reformation.
Next morning the noise and bustle broke out again in the inn and inn-yard. The citizens of Bethlehem went about their work; the registration proceeded; and in the meantime the greatest event in the history of the world had taken place.
We never know where a great beginning may be happening. Every arrival of a new soul in the world is a mystery of possibilities. Joseph and Mary alone knew the tremendous secret—that on her, the peasant maiden and carpenter’s bride, had been conferred the honor of being the mother of Him who was the Messiah of her race, the Saviour of the world, the Son of God.
It had been foretold in ancient prophecy that He should be born on this very spot. “But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall He come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel” (Micah 5:2). The proud emperor’s decree drove southward the anxious couple. Yes, but another hand was leading them on—the hand of Him who overrules the purposes of emperors and kings, of statesmen and parliaments, for the accomplishment of His designs, though they know them not. He who hardened the heart of Pharaoh, called Cyrus like a slave to His foot, made the mighty Nebuchadnezzar His servant, in the same way overruled for His own far-reaching purpose the pride and ambition of Augustus.
Written by James Stalker