We pulled into the Palestinian town in our big charter bus and parked in a garage with a number of other tourist buses. Next came our navigation through the streets filled with shopkeepers and various merchants selling their wares including a "Stars and Bucks" made to look like Starbucks. The excitement within me continued to mount the closer we got to the Church of the Nativity. When we finally arrived, my professor gave us a few last minute instructions concerning the church then let us go in. At first I looked around wondering if the structure she had pointed to really was the Church of the Nativity. Having already been to sites such as the Church of the Holy Sepulcher and the Dormition Abbey, I was a bit taken aback by the sight of the Church of the Nativity. The image I had built up in my mind didn't match what I saw on the outside. To be sure the disrepair is understandable since it has been in existence since the 6th century. Still, the sight of the structure was halting. It was not what I expected at all.
As you walk into the building, the doorway is significantly smaller than a normal door. It is this way so that you must bow down as you enter into the building. Originally it was intended to keep conquerors and looters from entering the church on horseback. Today it attempts to move tourists and pilgrims into a state of contemplation as they enter the church that sits on the site where Jesus was born. This was perhaps the most moving part of the church. Upon making my way through the door I was immediately struck by how loud it was. There was a line that made its way from the back of the church to the front and down into the grotto where it is believed Jesus was born. The day we were there, there were a couple hundred tourists and pilgrims waiting in line to get into the grotto. In fact the church was so loud that I struggled hearing myself think, let alone pray. This was far from what I had imagined. An emotion that I had not anticipated began to sneak in: Disappointment. The images that I had built up in my mind began to fade away as this unexpected image began to take its place.
Now I traveled all over the nation of Israel. I visited numerous sites that left me in deep contemplation and utterly humbled. Some places were simply breathtaking and almost everywhere there was a palpable sense of the Holy One in our midst, yet here at the place where everything changed, the place where Jesus left his throne to dwell among us, something was missing. It was hard to put a finger on what exactly made this place different. Perhaps it was the sheer number of tourists, or the doubt and speculation concerning the authenticity of the site, or perhaps the grotto itself that was rather cramped and filled with people taking pictures. Whatever it was, there was certainly a sense of unmet expectations. Now before you think my experience an anomaly, James Martin a Jesuit priest and author of Jesus, A Pilgrimage, writes of having a similar experience. He says, "The Nativity Grotto was the only place where one of my original objections to visiting the Holy Land - the touristy sites would turn me off - proved justified." Even in talking with others several expressed that it wasn't at all what they were expecting. Despite the reassurance that I wasn't alone in this, I felt almost guilty for feeling this way and so I tried praying all the more. This was the place where God took on flesh, where he came and made his dwelling among us and yet standing in the church I felt nothing but the sting of disappointment. It occurred to me much later however, how appropriate this feeling was.
At the time of Christ, the Israelites were being governed by Herod the Great who was essentially a puppet king of Rome, one of the most brutal empires of all time. Their rule was harsh and the Israelites suffered enormously under their reign. Throughout the Intertestamental Period, the Israelites continued to hold on to the promise of a coming Messiah. They believed that a king would rise from David's line who would free them of their oppressors and then establish the nation of Israel forever. They expected a Warrior King. Jesus came as an infant. Paul would later describe the cross and Jesus' sacrifice as a scandalon, the Greek term meaning a stumbling block, an offense, the same term we get the word "scandal" from. His birth was little different from his death in that regard. The Messiah, the one that an entire nation had been waiting for, indeed all of creation had waited for, came almost unexpectedly and unnoticed. It came with little fanfare except for the angels that appeared to the shepherds and the wise men that followed the star. Indeed, his birth was not how the Israelites had imagined it would be, one could say, it was disappointing.
Yet isn't this often our experience with God? Aren't there times in our lives, where we expected God to act a certain way only to have that expectation go unmet? If I'm honest, there have been numerous times where I have been left scratching my head wondering what God was thinking. Situations that simply didn't make sense and left me feeling disappointed. I'm sure that I'm not alone in this feeling. Undoubtedly, all of us have experienced this a time or two in our lives. One thing about God though, he never promises we won't be disappointed. He does however promise that He is good, that He is sovereign, and that His ways are far above ours. I seem to lose track of that. Often wishing God would ask me my thoughts on the matter before acting. Yet the life of Jesus shows us this exact thing. In the feeding of the five thousand, his disciples expected him to send the crowds away so that they could get food. Jesus' response? You feed them! His disciples thought he was going into Jerusalem to overthrow the Roman oppressors, instead he was crucified by them. Throughout his life, Jesus made it a habit of doing the unexpected and sometimes even disappointing those close to him. Yet, even in the midst of disappointment Jesus sets the stage for the remarkable. He feeds the five thousand with a few loaves of bread and some fish. After being crucified he is raised from the dead. His ways truly are above ours.
I think we often get disappointed when we hold too tightly to our own expectations failing to realize that God wants to do something far greater. The door to the Church of the Nativity is a powerful rebuttal to the disappointment I felt in the church. It reminded me that sometimes I need to let go of my expectations and simply bow in obedience before God. Indeed, sometimes in order for God to do something remarkable He must first disappoint our expectations, only then can we be prepared for the unexpected.
The doorway into the Church of the Nativity
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