Who is in the Guest Room
We are midway through the final week of the year — that strange stretch where time feels suspended, neither fully behind us nor fully ahead.
Many of us are given time off. Some slow down and catch their breath. Others push forward, determined not to lose momentum.
I’ve chosen to slow down after the long marathon of the season. I don’t want to perform or produce. I want to linger, even hide, and listen to what has been stirring beneath the noise.
A few years ago, I gave into the world of Hallmark Christmas movies when 2020 became unbearable. I wanted some escapism. I didn’t want to watch anything that raised my anxiety or filled me with sorrow. I wanted something predictable and safe.
This year, Hallmark didn’t disappoint. It delivered just what I wanted. But as I binge-watched five renditions of the same love story, I noticed an ache bubbling to the surface. An ache that is easy to ignore when I am busy. An ache that can’t be cured by a Hallmark movie.
This gap between Christmas and New Year’s exposes the overcrowded village of my heart. I have been reflecting on Christ’s arrival into our world as a baby born in a manger because there was no room in the inn. I’ve always thought of this inn as a hotel, but it wasn’t.
The inn was actually a guest room in a private residence. The Greek word Luke uses to describe this is kataluma. Kataluma means “a place to stay,” often a guest room located in the upper room of a home. This changes the way I view the birth of our Messiah.
Joseph and Mary arrive in Bethlehem in order to register for the census. Bethlehem is overcrowded with others doing the same. In a culture steeped in hospitality, it would have been shameful to turn away an expectant mother. Someone opened their door to Mary and Joseph, giving them the only space they had available-a manger. A lowly place where animals were fed.
Lacking proper understanding, I’ve judged these unknown people. How dare you offer a manger to Mary and Joseph? How could you not make space in your guest room? I failed to miss the beauty of them opening up their crowded door to them. What little they had, they gave. They made space in lowly places.
This brings me back to the overcrowded village of my heart. Heavy topics are taking residence in my guest rooms. I hear Jesus knocking at my door, “Will you let me in?”
“Lord, I desire, but my home is too full to make room. I only have a small space, it’s humble and broken. It’s not a lot, but I have some room.”
Will you let me in?” He says.
“Yes, Lord, I will.”
Our majestic King entered the world with deliberate humility. He entered an overcrowded space and transformed the ordinary. In the spaces of our lives that seem unremarkable, the Messiah takes residence.
Before He died, Jesus needed another room. A final feast was prepared in a kataluma. The place once unavailable to Him at the beginning of His earthly life was intentionally made ready for His end.
After His death and ascension, the disciples gathered in the upper room. The kataluma was filled with prayer and expectation for the Holy Spirit to arrive. The disciples were experiencing their own Twixmas, the close of an era and the dawn of the new. They embraced this time with faith and hopeful anticipation. They lingered in the kataluma, leaving space in their hearts for what Jesus promised- His Spirit.
In His Love,
Danielle Kelly