The Manger Holds All We Need

“Mary’s fiancé Joseph, from Nazareth in Galilee, had to participate in the census in the same way everyone else did. Because he was a descendant of King David, his ancestral city was Bethlehem, David’s birthplace. Mary, who was now late in her pregnancy that the messenger Gabriel had predicted, accompanied Joseph. While in Bethlehem, she went into labor and gave birth to her firstborn son. She wrapped the baby in a blanket and laid Him in a feeding trough because the inn had no room for them.”- Luke 2:4-7 (Voice)

The Creator God in dewy, baby skin was not laid in a golden crib, but a wood box that hours earlier had been a plate and cup for barn animals.

A manger has become a much more delicate way of describing the first bed of our Lord Jesus. It was in fact a feeding trough. The dictionary describes the term, trough, in a variety of ways. 

Trough: the lowest point; especially in economics
Trough: box-like receptacle holds water and food for animals; holds an animals sustenance

The trough that held Divinity, was likely muddy and wet, covered in the spit and slobber of farm animals. It is our first glimpse into the mission of the Messiah–to bring the touch of Divinity to the mess of our lives.

Jesus came not only to clean up our feeding trough, but also to lie down in it with us.

He doesn’t ask us to clean our trough before He comes to lay in it with us. Instead He allows Himself to be laid right in the middle of our present dirt and filth and need, because that is the only cure. The only way to clean an impure heart is to allow Jesus, the God-Man, to come and be Immanuel, God With Us, in the lowest, poorest state of our being.

Jesus was laid inside a feeding trough “because the inn had no room for Him.” The reason a feeding trough was all that was offered to the Messiah is because there was no room elsewhere.

He didn’t come because we had room for Him, He came because we did not. He knows our needs better than we do. Our rejection of Him or His ways does not repel Him, it compels Him. It compels His sacred heart to overwhelming compassion on our behalf. It moves Him to deep and abiding love, and to generous and selfless sacrifice. Our needs cause His heart to take the role of Servant and to offer Himself as the sustenance for our souls.

The holidays give us the opportunity to visit the manger again and to look into the feeding trough and allow Jesus to be our sustenance, our daily bread, and living water. 

The feeding trough of our Lord beckons to us to bring our broken hearts, our difficult days, our newfound joys, our gratitude, and leave it there in the manger where it all began.

Our Lord actually sacrificed Himself twice on our behalf. Once at the feeding trough and the other on the Cross. He left all He was, entrusted Himself to His Heavenly Father, humbled Himself and experienced all of humanity: conception, growing inside a womb, the trials of life, the joys.

He went through it all so that there would not be one piece of the human experience that He had not been through Himself and conquered. He did that so He could offer us the ability through Him to overcome it all. 

We were never designed to create our own sustenance or depend upon ourselves for what we need, but to partake of the elements laid out on the table that is the feeding trough. In partaking of His offering we create a holy dependence on Him to be the one to make all things new, to help us persevere, to recognize His presence in our daily lives as we go to work, shop at the store, drive in our car, and do our laundry.

“Don’t be afraid! Listen! I bring good news, news of great joy, news that will affect all people everywhere. Today, in the city of David, a Liberator has been born for you! He is the promised Anointed One, the Supreme Authority! You will know you have found Him when you see a baby, wrapped in a blanket, lying in a feeding trough.”- Luke 2:10-12

“You will know” you’ve found Him when you see Him in the trough. It is not as much of a struggle to know Jesus in the easier times when cares are not as many and we feel we have some control in our lives. 

However, if we can see Him in the trough of our lives–our low points–then we can truly come to know Him for the reasons He came. That lowly place can become an abundant buffet filling us to the full of His Immanuel presence, God with us. 

The night God came near

Peace was offered to you in a feeding trough 

The Creator was cradled by His created

Divinity was birthed by humanity, born of dust

The same dust that was breathed to life by Divinity’s breath

The blood of a Savior mingling with the blood of those who could never pay the price