We started the week thinking of doors, and we end with another common item from the transition of outside to the inside.
Doormats are not highly regarded things… that is, unless you are the one doing the housework and you are really hoping that you won’t have to clean up the mud or dust that can get tracked into the house. At least that is the intent of using a doormat if you live in a place where people keep their shoes on when entering a building. Door mats have had such a poor connotation that they are often called “Welcome mats” to boost their social standing.
One saying we get from the doormat is:
“Put out the Welcome mat” to show we make an effort to make a guest feel welcome.
A smile is your personal welcome mat.
Although most are along the line of :
“Don’t treat me like a doormat” to express that we feel stepped on.
“If you make yourself into a doormat, people will wipe their feet on youâ€
Whatever we think of it, we look down at a doormat because its place is a lowly one. Maybe with an attitude of appreciation, or maybe with an attitude of disdain, while for the most part we don’t think of it much at all… unless walking in a doorway. It gets our attention for a moment, and we decide how we will enter the home… with care to wipe our feet, remove our shoes, or ignoring the silent sign to respect those within?
The quality of meekness could be viewed in much the same way. Meekness is one of those traits that people don’t think of highly, if they think of it at all. Yet, it is one of the traits that God considers as very important. Is He the housekeeper of the Heavenly portals? How odd to think of God that way, since we usually think of Him in a throneroom, and so He does dwell there! But at Christmas…. at Christmas, God disguised Himself. He changed the way we are to look at power, authority, and prestige when He came at Christmastime.
Our response to all our fellow men shows who we are and our behavior is taken as our response to God Himself, God as disguised in circumstance. Much the way Jesus came humbly, in human flesh, to an insignificant part of the the world, to a downtrodden people, with no fanfare, and no servants…. instead to be a Servant – in much the same way we are to interact in our world. Yes, whoever we are, the greatest among us is the least and that is the new standard of power and prestige.
Servants. Such are often viewed as the doormats of the world. But this event we celebrate at Christmas gives us a different view of the position of the doormats. Their purposes may not be appreciated, their service may be quiet, but Someone is noticing and values their contributions to the household. Shouldn’t we do likewise?
Can you look differently at the common everyday things of life? The people you see as “common and everyday”? Can you put out the “Welcome mat” this season and with meekness invite God into your life? It might be just doing a kindness or extending a comfort, it may be making the face of a child light up, but can you find the Lord disguised among us today?
Is there a welcome for us? The household of God, in the abode of the Almighty, in the Everlasting dwellings welcomes us all. We simply need to enter humbly through the one door we are given. The one door God created to accommodate our failures and inadequacies. And when we enter, let’s not block the doorway to those around us, let’s stand at the entry with a welcoming spirit.
Let’s look for Him in the season ahead, and put out the Welcome mat first in our heart and then in our actions. How might the Innkeeper of Bethlehem wish he had done so if he knew who it was that appeared at his door? I just wonder.
Sing “Away in a Manger” today.
The Jesse tree ornament is a ladder, which represents Jacob: “Surely the Lord is in this place; and I did not know it.” ~Genesis (28:11–19)
Flickr photos from:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/acme/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cmatsuoka/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/fletcherprince/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/listener42/
