‘Our barefooted God’: humility as the way to life

The census that Caesar Augustus decreed was basically a tax imposition. By ordering the counting of the population according to their location, the Emperor could then impose a set tax on each town, village, region and city throughout the empire. You would not call this a fair taxation policy, but it was certainly an effective one. He had the power.

Augustus was the first of the Roman emperors to declare himself a god. These were times when the gods were measured by their power over people’s lives. The more powerful, the more godly.

That Augustus could impose a tax regime on the whole world revealed the extent of his god-like powers. But he weakened in his reign and eventually died, to be forgotten except in history books and museums. Power over people’s lives does not last.

When the one, true God came among us, the promised Messiah, it would be in the most minor of locations where the census was being taken—Bethlehem, an all-but-forgotten town, a nowhere place, in the vast Roman empire. And even then, it would take place at the lowest end of that lowly town, in a stable, not a home; and in an animal’s trough, not a bed.

Yet, here is the true sign of God, the God who would not seek to depart from humanity, but who would take on our humanity. In Bethlehem, during the first census ever taken, Emmanuel—God with us—was born; and he has endured, for his power abides in people’s lives.

A prayer I recently heard put it this way:

[Jesus], when the soles of your feet touch the ground,
… you become one of us, to be at one with us.

This image of the bare feet of God touching the same earth on which we make our homes is the true sign of Godliness. For in the birth of Jesus, the divinity of God was born into our humanity, humbly and unassumingly.

In a stable, God came to us, withholding nothing of himself from us. Barefooted—taking on our flesh, our human condition—in order to touch, and to be touched, in the circumstances of our lives. Christmas is God placing an exclamation mark on his words, ‘I am with you!’

Jesus—God with us—did not claim divinity for himself, but emptied himself for our sake (as St Paul masterfully put it). God stepped out onto our human stage at the lowest point on earth. At the very moment Augustus was flexing his muscles in a power play from on high, Jesus entered the world from below, humbly and into the mess. ‘God casts the mighty from their thrones, and raises the lowly,’ said his Mother.

This inversion of power from the beginning of his humanity would continue through to his end. The humble wood of the manger would be replaced with the humiliating wood of the cross. Yet our barefooted God, who bent down from heaven to touch the earth, so as to get his feet dirty, showed that this way of humility is the genuine way to life.

He conquered by humbling himself. He healed through his wounds. He reigned from below. God saved us by sacrificing himself. The way of power does not triumph—history is full of the debris of failed attempts. It is grace that illumines the way, joy that overcomes sadness, and a humble love that pierces the dark of our nights.

I wonder if, this Christmas, it is not time for us to come ‘barefoot’ in our frailties before this little child who is God-among-us? In him we find ourselves alive in the wonder of our humanity—made in his image—ready and willing to live as the people God created us to be: fraternally and generously; forgiving and hopeful.

May Jesus, the barefooted child of the living God, fill you and your loved ones with abundant joy and peace. Happy Christmas!