While Watching Rocky Ford Road

Rocky Ford Road is the paved road about a half mile from the house.  A dirt road between here and there is the connecting link.  As Christmas Eve darkened I stood for a moment on the front porch looking across the field toward this stretch of asphalt.  The winter's work on tree foliage heightened both visibility and the unusual sound of cars and trucks on their journey.  To stand for a moment was to see the sight of headlights racing and to hear the roar of tires and engines on the road.  On Christmas Eve even the normally quiet Rocky Ford Road is busy with people on their way.

 

Perhaps, it was the same on the road leading to Bethlehem that night Joseph and Mary traveled.  Surely, they were not alone out there in the darkness.   Others were no doubt hurrying to get where they wanted to be before the night hours got too deep.  And, likely as not the journey seemed like a journey that would never end for the two who traveled.  Mary knew the time for birthing was near and Joseph was anxious to find a safe place.  Constantly they must have looked at one another with eyes which wondered, "How much farther can it be?"

In the darkness filled with uncertainty it must have been hard for them to know that they were not traveling alone.  In a way impossible for them to comprehend, God was with them.  It is no less true as we travel through the darkness which feels heavy upon our own life.  God is with us.  He is with us in ways impossible for us to comprehend.  There is a sense that He is the One who set us out on this journey we travel.  We are sometimes in such a hurry to get to some place like the lighted streets of Bethlehem that we forget the One who sent us out is with us not only in the lighted places where we feel safe, but also in the dark places where danger and uncertainty seem present at every step.