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A unique part of the Christmas season is the plethora of images that can help immerse us in the scene of Jesus' birth 2,000 years ago.
Nativity scenes in particular can assist us in jogging our imagination, putting us right there with Jesus in the stable at Bethlehem.
Poems have a similar ability to help form our view of the Christmas scene and G.K. Chesterton wrote several poems that expertly immerse us into the humble abode of Jesus. Chesterton loved the Christmas season and many argue over which poem is the best that he wrote about Christmas.
For your consideration is a poem he wrote entitled "The House of Christmas," which compares the homelessness of the Holy Family with our own quest to find a lasting home.
One line sticks out that can really jog our spiritual lives: "Only where He was homeless, Are you and I at home."
The House of Christmas
There fared a mother driven forth
Out of an inn to roam;
In the place where she was homeless
All men are at home.
The crazy stable close at hand,
With shaking timber and shifting sand,
Grew a stronger thing to abide and stand
Than the square stones of Rome.
For men are homesick in their homes,
And strangers under the sun,
And they lay their heads in a foreign land
Whenever the day is done.
Here we have battle and blazing eyes,
And chance and honor and high surprise,
But our homes are under miraculous skies
Where the yule tale was begun.
A Child in a foul stable,
Where the beasts feed and foam,
Only where He was homeless
Are you and I at home;
We have hands that fashion and heads that know,
But our hearts we lost - how long ago!
In a place no chart nor ship can show
Under the sky's dome.
This world is wild as an old wives' tale,
And strange the plain things are,
The earth is enough and the air is enough
For our wonder and our war;
But our rest is as far as the fire-drake swings
And our peace is put in impossible things
Where clashed and thundered unthinkable wings
Round an incredible star.
To an open house in the evening
Home shall men come,
To an older place than Eden
And a taller town than Rome.
To the end of the way of the wandering star,
To the things that cannot be and that are,
To the place where God was homeless
And all men are at home.
