Religion: A Pastor Ponders

The Christmas Door

by Pastor William Jenkins

December 24, 2005

Night Shots of Yard Decor. Photos By Marilyn Clark, League City Area News Online

Symbolism abounds in our celebration of the Christmas season. For me the most meaningful symbol of Christmas is found in Manger Square in Bethlehem. At the far end of Manger Square is the Church of the Nativity.

Standing at a distance one can see in the front wall of the Church progressive reductions to the entrance. The imprint of an arch high upon the wall lets us know the entrance was originally much larger. The arch has been bricked in. Below the evidence of the arch are large stones outlining a great gate that once allowed people to enter. The great gate has also been bricked in.

Today there is a small door about three feet wide and 5 feet high through which one must pass to gain entrance to the Church of the Nativity. For me that small door is the most meaningful symbol of Christmas. One must bow in order to enter the birthplace of Jesus, just as the Shepherds and Wise Men did.

The small door to the Church of the Nativity admits one into a wide and spacious place with high ceilings and broad walls. While the entrance to the Church is small, the place itself is quite spacious and has, over the centuries, accommodated millions of people from every country on earth and every status of life.

Within the Church, and off to the side of the altar, is the stone mantle of yet another small door that leads further down to the manger grotto where Mary laid her first born Son. Worn with the passage of pilgrims seeking a closer connection to the Story, that door separates those who merely admire Christmas from a distance and those who truly understand it.

Helen Wickenden wrote:

“The entrance to His place of birth is by a little door;
So humble, all might find Him there, the wise, the rich, the poor.
A little door, where cows had passed, opened to a King!
The Shepherds and the Wise Men bent to see so fair a thing.”

While you make your way through this Christmas season with the glow and glimmer of its symbols, I hope you will notice somewhere the small door that leads to a closer, more intimate relationship with this greatest of Stories.

League City United Methodist Church is located at 1411 Main Street (FM 518), one block east of Interstate 45. For information, call the church offices at 281-332-1557 or visit the website at

HYPERLINK - http://www.lcumc.org