Luke 2:4-6 “So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child.”

Neither Nazareth nor Bethlehem were the center of the world at the time. Rome was the center of power. Athens, Greece or Alexandria, Egypt were great centers of culture and learning. Even in Israel, Jerusalem was the beating heart of the nation.

Bethlehem was just a distant little suburb. Nazareth was an insignificant village in a disrespected province, a place where the people talked funny and did things backwards. You may remember when Jesus called a man named Philip to be his disciple, and Philip invited his friend Nathaniel to come and meet Jesus. “We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law, and about whom the prophets also wrote–Jesus of Nazareth…” “Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?”

And yet, when Christ came down from heaven, he was conceived in one and born in the other. These were the two little towns he visited and considered his home–not the capital of the empire or the capital of his own country. It was here where the simple, ordinary people lived–shepherds and carpenters, innkeepers and maidens–that he grew up and learned his trade. He did not consider himself too proud, or too important, to make these people his people. And until the day he died it was mostly people like this who followed him and called him Lord.

Where do you come from? Where do you call home? I live in Norman, Oklahoma. It has a university. It fancies itself as a cultured, open-minded, inclusive place. Not so long ago it wasn’t very cultured, open-minded, or inclusive at all. Fifty years ago it was still a “sundown” town. People of color had to leave before the sun set or expect trouble. I don’t point this out to minimize the progress that has been made since then. I am simply saying that coming from this mid-sized Midwestern city isn’t going to impress people the way that residence in New York, Los Angeles, London, or Paris might.

My family doesn’t come from anywhere prestigious. My parents grew up in little farming towns in Minnesota. I remember the sign along the highway saying the population of my dad’s hometown was 300 when I was a little boy. Places like these are in the middle of the country. People on the east or west coast call this “flyover territory.” It’s their way of saying, “Not much going on in that part of the world.”

Most of us are ordinary people who get up in the morning and try to make a living. History will not remember our names, not even in a footnote.

And yet, Jesus did not consider himself too proud or too important to make people like us his people. He still comes down to us. He visits our little towns, too, not dressed in human skin and human clothes, but clothed in the gospel message that speaks his forgiveness and makes his home in our hearts.

He came to us in the hands that baptized us and the mouths that taught us to know him–a parent, a pastor, a Sunday School teacher, a friend. He comes down to us today, to visit the humble little church while we hear his word. He still visits our little towns, wherever they are, like he visited two little towns called Nazareth and Bethlehem, when he came down to save us.