You know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that you through his poverty might become rich.
2 Corinthians 8:9.
Prospective parents nowadays buy a cot for the child they are expecting before it is born. Mary, however, had to lay her Son in a “manger, because there was no room for them in the inn” (Luke 2:7). When Jesus began His public ministry, the crowds pressed so closely around Him that He boarded a ship and preached to them from there. It is noticeable that the ship did not belong to Him, but to Simon Peter.
On another occasion a man came to Jesus, saying that he wanted to follow Him. Jesus pointed out to him just what that meant: “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of man has nowhere to lay his head” (Luke 9, 58). Before the Son of God entered Jerusalem for the last time, He sent two disciples to fetch the foal of an ass for Him. The reason they were to give was: “The Lord has need of it” (Luke 19:31). The Lord needed it to fulfil the Old Testament prophecy in Zecharaiah 9. v.9, but also because He did not own one Himself.
Before the memorable last Passover with His disciples He made two of them inquire after a suitable room: “Where is the guest room where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?” Luke 22:11). He Himself had no guest room. Betrayed, denied, and abandoned, Jesus died for us and our sins and was buried – not in His own grave, but in a tomb belonging to Joseph of Arimathea. The Son of God became poor on our behalf. May we ever be thankful to Him!
Image: By © Guillaume Piolle, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=13288483