December 21, 2025

Bit-Players in the Nativity #4 – The Innkeeper

During these Sundays, I have been examining those characters in the nativity drama with only small parts (bit-players, Hollywood calls them).  In fact, the parts for the characters we are speaking about are so small that they are never even mentioned in the Bible.  The most famous of these unmentioned bit-players, of course, is the innkeeper.

We have always given him a part in Christmas pageants because since the Bible says, “there was no room for them in the inn,” we assume there must have been an innkeeper to convey the sad message – this being long before the neon “no vacancy” signs warned motorists to just keep driving.

“No room,” we imagine him saying to the young couple.  Hogwash!  Of course there was room – or, at least there would have been, if this couple had been prominent citizens, emissaries of the King, or traveling with papers from the Emperor.  Almost 500 years ago, Martin Luther, commenting on the second chapter of Luke, referred to Mary and Joseph as “the lowest and most despised, and [those who] must make way for everyone until they are shoved into a stable to make common lodging and table with the cattle.”  He writes that the people at the inn “did not recognize what God was doing in the stable.  With all their eating, drinking, and finery, God left them empty, and his comfort and treasure was hidden from them.”

So, the image is timeless.  And it speaks even today.  You and I have also been the ones living it up with food and drink and music, never suspecting that the knock at the door, the embarrassing and untimely intrusion, the interruption from the inappropriate one out back in the stable, might be the gentle voice of the Lord seeking room in our world, in our lives, in our schedules.

We understand the innkeeper perhaps better than we do this extraordinary couple who followed a Divine promise to the stable in Bethlehem.  We are not given to pursuing visions and hearing angel voices.  We have no room in our busy lives for such nonsense.

It’s a simple matter of arithmetic.  A job, a family, a house to keep up, bills to pay, friends to visit, meetings to go to, all add up.  And there’s simply no room in the schedule for anything else, certainly not for “extras,” or “non-productive” things like meditation, reading the Bible, getting together with others for reflection and spiritual growth, paying attention to the world around you and listening for the voice of the Holy Spirit.  Those are the last things you and I generally will take time out of our busy lives for.  In short, if angels were to visit us with “good tidings of a great joy,” would anyone be listening?  And if the world were pregnant with hope and meaning, might we consign its birthing to the barn because we’re too busy trying to have fun?

We might ask ourselves, you and I: with all the terribly important things that fill our lives, what might we be missing out on?

And this question: if the Holy Lord’s own pregnant promise were standing in front of us, knocking on our door, would we recognize it?

Divine disclosure is often obscure.  It seems at times like the Lord of Life is playing a rather cruel joke on us, concealing wisdom in that which seems foolish, hiding strength in that which appears weak, disguising divinity in the clothes of a pauper.  Here’s the dilemma at the heart of the incarnation: If Jesus identifies himself with the poor, the hungry, the thirsty, the naked, the strangers, the sick, the prisoners, how in the world are we supposed to tell them apart, the Messiah and the dead-beats?  It’s as if we’re supposed to have a hard time identifying the divine; maybe such a hard time that we’re forced to look for it everywhere.

I’m sure we’ve all heard the spiritual, and we know its truth: “Sweet little Jesus-boy, they didn’t know who you was.”  But we still don’t – we who are the innkeepers of the world.  If the Divine Miracle came knocking on our front door, how would we recognize it?  There are a few clues in this Christmas story.  Most significantly, it seems clear that the Word of Truth is not sent to us in packages that we expect.  The Messiah comes not as a distinguished guest with an impressive entourage, but as a pregnant girl looking for a place to sleep.  So look for the Divine promise where you would least expect to find it.  For one thing, look for it in the arguments of the person you can’t stand.  If the current national political frenzy tells us anything, I hope it is this: opposing points of view can be based on high principles held passionately.  It is rarely the case that one of them is totally right and the other totally wrong.  Perhaps what we need are leaders who can stop shouting at each other long enough to listen, and to craft a reasoned, principled, and compassionate way forward.  And perhaps each of us might benefit from realizing that high principles held passionately are sometimes just another way of trying to win.  So, don’t get so caught up in talking with your own circle of friends that you slam the door on a differing idea when it knocks.  You never know, it just might be the voice of Eternity.

Look for the divine in the lowly and the outcast.  Don’t expect eternal truth to come in a nicely crafted sound-bite on the evening news, but look for it in the eyes of the old woman you walk past in the nursing home.  If Christ were to walk among us, he is more likely to be found among the poor folks from the other side of the tracks, or those made homeless by government ineptitude, than among the politicians and power brokers of our land.  Look for him in the backwater towns and the third world countries.

Has Jesus come knocking on our doors this Christmas Season?  If so, how have we received him?  By filling our lives with the busy-ness of living, avoiding the deeper spiritual and social issues, devoting ourselves more to the trappings of the season than to the One who comes looking for room in our hearts, taking up our time with all the other honored guests in our house of priorities?

Will we fail to recognize the presence of Christ in the poorly dressed person with a foul odor, the friend with a need to share, the emotionally disabled person who is disregarded?  Will we dismiss the divine wisdom in the person who disagrees with us, slamming the door on them and contenting ourselves with the company of our like-minded friends?  Will we do our best to keep people “in their places,” only tolerating those who are different “so long as they keep quiet and stay out back with the cows?”  When Christ knocks on the door of our hearts, will our answer be, “Sorry, no room?”

Archie Showen shared a marvelous story that’s one of my favorites.  It’s about a little child, a handicapped child, who wanted to have a lead role in the Christmas pageant.  “He longed to be Joseph,” Showen writes, “but that part was awarded to the teacher’s pet.  He would have been satisfied to have been one of the wise men, but these parts went to the rich kids who could dress in their exquisite bathrobes and look like kings.  He was even rejected as a shepherd – no one could imagine a shepherd on crutches.  The part remaining was his – the inn-keeper.  His little heart ached as he dreaded having to reject the Christ-child.  When the night for the play arrived, the room was packed.  The curtain was pulled and the play began with Joseph’s knock on the door of the inn.  His big moment had arrived and he could stand it no longer.  With all his might he flung open the door of the inn and shouted at the top of his voice, ‘Come in!  I’ve been expecting you!’  The audience roared and a thunderous applause broke out.  His acceptance of Christ ended the play and everyone remarked that it was the best Christmas they had ever seen.”

Maybe it’s time we rewrote the story.  Maybe this coming year we should put candles in the windows of the Bethlehem inn as a sign of welcome and keep an eye out for the holy family.  Not knowing who they are, maybe we should just welcome everyone, and sleep in the barn ourselves if need be.  Maybe when a disheveled couple approach looking for help we should throw open the doors of the inn and say, “Come in!  I’ve been expecting you!”

The attempt to do so is very old, and etched into our very traditions.  The way we celebrate Christmas is patterned after an ancient Roman festival that honored just such a revolutionary idea.  We landed on December 25th for Christmas, you know, because (according to the mythologist, Thomas Bulfinch) early Christians seized upon the Roman festival of Saturnalia as a good time to celebrate the birth of Christ.  Bulfinch writes, “. . .the feast of Saturnalia was held every year in the winter season.  Then all public business was suspended, declaration of war and criminal executions were postponed, friends made presents to one another, and the slaves were indulged with great liberties.  A feast was given to them where they sat at table, while their masters served them, to show the natural equality . . . and that all things belonged equally to all . . . .”

So, we stand in a good tradition with this December celebration.  And we’re still trying to live up to a very high ideal: to break down the barriers between us and give birth to peace and equality, to change the story of Bethlehem and say there is room for Christ – always room.