No room in the inn

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Thursday, December 14th. You’re listening to WORLD Radio and we’re so glad you are! Good morning. I’m Mary Reichard.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: And I’m Myrna Brown.

One more quick reminder about WORLD’s December Giving Drive. This month is a crucial one for us. December is when the biggest share of our annual revenue comes in, and if WORLD has made a difference in your life, if you’ve gotten something from our programs, from our news reporting, features, and commentary, we’re asking that you support it at any level you can afford.

REICHARD: That’s right. And if you give either today or tomorrow, a generous WORLD Mover will give right alongside you and match your gift dollar for dollar, just an added incentive to give early if you can.

BROWN: Double impact! I do love a good deal!

REICHARD: Me, too. I took advantage, and I hope it generates some momentum. Sort of like the Little Engine That Could. Get started, get going, and pick up steam!

BROWN: The drive is going on all month long, and we’d really love to hear from you. Just go to wng.org/donate.

REICHARD: Easy peasy, yet so critical to keep this program coming to you and keep growing. wng.org/donate.

BROWN: And thank you so much!

Well, coming next on The World and Everything in It: an audio postcard from Bethlehem.

Christians in Bethlehem have long put on festive celebrations of Christ’s birth. But in the wake of the Israel-Hamas war, Christian leaders in the city made a difficult decision.

MUNTHER ISAAC: This year, Christmas celebrations are canceled in Bethlehem, and for obvious reasons.

REICHARD: That’s Munther Isaac, pastor of the Evangelical Lutheran Christmas Church in Bethlehem. He says that Palestinian Christians find it impossible to celebrate when civilians are dying in Gaza and so many churches in Bethlehem will be foregoing festivities. Isaac’s church has replaced its traditional Christmas tree with a mound of rubble and a model of baby Jesus lying on top.

MUNTHER ISAAC: Jesus identifies with our suffering. So it's a message of comfort and hope to us.

BROWN: People who suffer. Perhaps now is a good time to remember the prince of peace who was born in humility to be a suffering servant as Isaiah prophesied.

WORLD reporter Jenny Lind Schmitt visited Bethlehem back in the Spring, and she brought back this audio postcard as a reminder of Christ’s humble first coming.

SOUND: [Footsteps on a trail]

JENNY LIND SCHMITT, REPORTER: Earlier this year, before the Israel-Hamas war shut down tourism, a group of Americans walked a path in Beit Sahour, the village just to the east of Bethlehem.

The Shepherd’s Field is an enclosed park at the top of a gently sloping hill. It’s one of two possible places in the village thought to be where the angels appeared to the shepherds, as recorded in Luke 2. The path leads down around stones and olive trees through an active archaeological site. Then one by one, the group members duck down through a small opening and disappear.

JOHN DELANCEY: Welcome everyone to this big cave.

John DeLancey leads multiple tours to Israel each year as director of Biblical Israel Ministries and Tours. He’s led his group off the beaten track to this cave where there’s plenty of room for the 120 people to stand comfortably. And probably more than that number of sheep.

DELANCEY: Why a cave? Because shepherds used caves for their flocks. As you know, the Shepherds played an important role in announcing the birth narrative of Jesus.

The Judean hills are made up of limestone. As water dripped slowly through the layers of rock over the years, it hollowed out many caves like this one. Archaeological evidence shows they were used to keep sheep.

DELANCEY: But I want to talk a little about the role of the shepherd, because they were culturally speaking deemed unclean just by virtue of their occupation.

Even though shepherds were shunned, the Mishnah, or Jewish oral traditions, referred to a special area near Jerusalem reserved for the shepherds who were responsible for raising the Passover lambs used in the Temple sacrificial system.

DELANCEY: The Mishnah hints that only those kinds of shepherds raising those types of sheep had permission to use the fields for their flocks.

Could it be that the shepherds that were in the vicinity of Jerusalem—and we know that the shepherds of the Luke 2 story were tending their sheep and allowing their sheep to graze their sheep in their fields at night.

It’s possible that the shepherds from the Luke 2 account were the ones raising the lambs to be sacrificed in the Temple. Then the angel sent them to see the newborn Christ Jesus who would one day make the final atoning sacrifice for his people.

SINGING: [O Come all ye faithful…]

Even though it’s stuffy and warm in the cave, and the sun is bright outside, Delancey leads the group in singing Christmas carols.

AUDIO: [People in a shop]

In nearby Bethlehem, the group visits Nissan Brothers olive wood shop. The Nissan family has made hand-carved nativity scenes in its shop for four generations. Each generation passed the craftsmanship down from father to son.

The family still uses Aramaic for worship and prayers in their local church community. John Nissan offers to pray for the group in his ancient language, to give them a flavor of the conversation between the shepherds and Mary and Joseph.

NISSAN: It is an honor to pray for you and to share with you the Lord’s Prayer in Aramaic language, the language of the Lord. [Prays in Aramaic]

This year the Christmas season in Bethlehem is very different from the past. The main Christian churches in the city jointly decided to cancel all celebrations and only hold religious services. There will be no Christmas tree, no decorative lights, no public festivities.

Willma Juha is a Palestinian tour guide in Bethlehem. She says that everyone is feeling a weight of sadness because of the war, but that the meaning of Christmas still remains.

WILLMA JUHA: We feel sad, but all that we can do here is pray. Because the most important thing is the birth of Jesus and the prayers. So the festival is something extra. If they cancelled it, okay, we are sad. Our kids are sad because they enjoy it, but the most important thing is still here.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Jenny Lind Schmitt in Bethlehem.

NISSAM: We love the Lord, we love you too, and welcome to Bethlehem.

WORLD Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of WORLD Radio programming is the audio record.