The Road to Bethlehem

Dust on their feet. Hills ahead of them. A young woman stops, one hand on her back, the other on her round belly, and takes a deep breath. Bethlehem is still a long way off.

The emperor Augustus has ordered a registration, and everyone must go to their family's home town to be counted. For most people, that is a nuisance. For Joseph, it means a long journey. He lives in Nazareth, a village in the green hills of Galilee, in the north. But Joseph's family line goes back to King David. And David's town was Bethlehem, far to the south in Judea, a few miles beyond Jerusalem. So Joseph must go there. And he does not go alone.

Luke tells it simply. Joseph went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and family of David. He went to be registered with Mary, his promised wife, who was great with child. Luke does not tell us why Mary came. Perhaps she needed to be registered too. Perhaps Joseph would not leave her behind in a village where people might talk. Either way, they set out together, with the baby due very soon.

Imagine the road. Many paintings show Mary on a donkey, and though Luke does not mention one, a family might well have taken an animal to carry their things. The way goes up and down, over stony hills and through valleys. Days are warm, nights are cold. There are other travellers too, all heading to their own towns, sharing wells and campfires. Every step must have been hard for Mary. She would have felt the baby kick. Joseph would have watched her, slowing down when she needed to, finding water, looking for a safe place each night.

And maybe, as they walked, they talked about everything that had happened. The angel who came to Mary. The dream that came to Joseph. Elizabeth's joy. The names they had been given: Jesus, the Lord saves. Emmanuel, God with us. Two ordinary people on an ordinary road, doing what the government told them to. Yet they were carrying the promise of the ages. And at last, over a ridge, they would have seen it: the little town of Bethlehem, where David once looked after his father's sheep.

How long was the trip? The Jewish historian Josephus, writing later in the first century, says that someone travelling quickly could get from Galilee to Jerusalem in three days, by taking the road through Samaria. Bethlehem lies a short distance further south. With a heavily pregnant woman, Joseph and Mary would very likely have travelled more slowly than that.

The road to Bethlehem is in Luke chapter two, verses four and five. Just two verses, but behind them, days of walking, waiting and trusting. So here is a question to carry with you. When the road ahead feels long and hard, who walks it with you, and how can you help someone else on theirs?