Room for Jesus? by Charles Spurgeon
“And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn.” — Luke 2:7
Have you room for Christ? Have you room for Christ? As the palace, and the forum, and the inn, have no room for Christ, and as the places of public resort have none, have you room for Christ?
“Well,” says one, “I have room for him, but I am not worthy that he should come to me.” Ah! I did not ask about worthiness; have you room for him? “Oh,” says one, “I have an empty void the world can never fill!” Ah! I see you have room for him. “Oh! but the room I have in my heart is so base!” So was the manger. “But it is so despicable!” So was the manger a thing to be despised. “Ah! but my heart is so foul!” So, perhaps, the manger may have been. “Oh! but I feel it is a place not at all fit for Christ!” Nor was the manger a place fit for him, and yet there was he laid.” Oh! but I have been such a sinner; I feel as if my heart had been a den of beasts and devils!” Well, the manger had been a place where beasts had fed. Have you room for him? Never mind what the past has been; he can forget and forgive. It matters not what even the present state may be if thou mourn it. If thou hast but room for Christ he will come and be thy guest.
Do not say, I pray you, “I hope I shall have room for him;” the time is come that he shall be born; Mary cannot wait months and years. Oh! sinner, if thou hast room for him let him be born in thy soul today. “Today, if ye will hear his voice harden not your hearts as in the provocation.” “Today is the accepted time; today is the day of salvation.” Room for Jesus! Room for Jesus now!
“Oh!” saith one, “I have room for him, but will he come?” Will he come indeed! Do you but set the door of your heart open, do but say, “Jesus, Master, all unworthy and unclean I look to thee; come, lodge within my heart,” and he will come to thee, and he will cleanse the manger of thy heart, nay, will transform it into a golden throne, and there he will sit and reign forever and forever. Oh! I have such a free Christ to preach this morning! I would I could preach him better. I have such a precious loving, Jesus to preach, he is willing to find a home in humble hearts. What! Are there no hearts here this morning that will take him in? Must my eye glance round these galleries and look at many of you who are still without him and are there none who will say, “Come in, come in?”
Oh! it shall be a happy day for you if you shall be enabled to take him in your arms and receive him as the consolation of Israel! You may then look forward even to death with joy, and say with Simeon — “Lord, now let thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation.” My Master wants room! Room for him! Room for him! I, his herald, cry aloud, Room for the Savior! Room! Here is my royal Master — have you room for him? Here is the Son of God made flesh — have you room for him? Here is he who can forgive all sin — have you room for him? Here is he who can take you up out of the horrible pit and out of the miry clay — have you room for him? Here is he who when he cometh in will never go out again, but abide with you forever to make your heart a heaven of joy and bliss for you-have you room for him? ‘Tis all I ask. Your emptiness, your nothingness, your want of feeling, your want of goodness, your want of grace — all these will be but room for him. Have you room for him? Oh! Spirit of God, lead many to say, “Yes, my heart is ready.”
Ah! then he will come and dwell with you.
“Joy to the world the Savior comes,
The Savior promised long;
Let every heart prepare a throne
And every voice a song.”
But I must remind you … that if you have room for Christ, then from this day forth remember THE WORLD HAS NO ROOM FOR YOU; for the text says not only that there was no room for him, but look — “There was no room for them,” — no room for Joseph, nor for Mary, any more than for the babe.
Who are his father, and mother, and sister, and brother, but those that receive his word and keep it? So, as there was no room for the blessed Virgin, nor for the reputed father, remember henceforth there is no room in this world for any true follower of Christ. There is no room for you to take your ease; no, you are to be a soldier of the cross, and you will find no ease in all your life-warfare. There is no room for you to sit down contented with your own attainments, for you are a traveler, and you are to forget the things that are behind, and press forward to that which is before; no room for you to hide your treasure in, for here the moth and rust doth corrupt; no room for you to put your confidence, for “Cursed is he that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm.” From this day there will be no room for you in the world’s good opinion — they will count you to be an offscouring; no room for you in the world’s polite society — you must go without the camp, bearing his reproach. From this time forth, I say, if you have room for Christ, the world will hardly find room of sufferance for you; you must expect now to be laughed at; now you must wear the fool’s cap in men’s esteem; and your song must be at the very beginning of your pilgrimage.
“Jesus, I thy cross have taken,
All to leave and follow thee;
Naked, poor, despised, forsaken,
Thou from hence my all shall be.”
There is no room for you in the worldling’s love. If you expect that everybody will praise you, and that your good actions will all be applauded, you will quite be mistaken. The world, I say, has no room for the man who has room for Christ. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. “Woe unto you when all men speak well of you.” “Ye are not of the world, even as Christ is not of the world.” Thank God, you need not ask the world’s hospitality. If it will give you but a stage for action and lend you for an hour a grave to sleep in, ‘tis all you need; you will require no permanent dwelling-place here, since you seek a city that is to come, which hath foundations whose builder and maker is God. You are hurrying through this world as a stranger through a foreign land, and you rejoice to know that though you are an alien and a foreigner here, yet you are a fellow citizen with the saints, and of the household to God. What say you, young soldier, will you enlist on such terms as these? Will you give room for Christ when there is to be henceforth no room for you — when you are to be separated forever, cut off from among the world’s kith and kin mayhap — cut off from carnal confidence forever? Are you willing, notwithstanding all this, to receive the traveler in? The Lord help you to do so and to him shall be glory forever and ever. Amen.
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