Lyrics
Thou didst leave Thy throne and Thy kingly crown
When Thou camest to earth for me;
But in Bethlehem's home was there found no room
For Thy holy nativity.
O come to my heart, Lord Jesus,
There is room in my heart for Thee.
Heaven's arches rang when the angels sang,
Proclaiming Thy royal degree;
But of lowly birth didst Thou come to earth,
And in great humility.
The foxes found rest, and the birds their nest
In the shade of the forest tree;
But Thy couch was the sod, O Thou Son of God,
In the deserts of Galilee.
Thou camest, O Lord, with the living Word
That should set Thy people free;
But with mocking scorn, and with crown of thorn,
They bore Thee to Calvary.
When the heavens shall ring, and the angels sing,
At Thy coming to victory,
Let Thy voice call me home, saying, "Yet there is room,
There is room at My side for thee."
My heart shall rejoice, Lord Jesus,
When Thou comest and callest for me.
Public domain hymn text (1864). Words by Emily E. S. Elliott.
The Story Behind the Hymn
Emily Elizabeth Steele Elliott, an English hymn writer and niece of hymn writer Charlotte Elliott, author of 'Just As I Am,' wrote 'Thou Didst Leave Thy Throne' in 1864, part of a considerable body of hymns she produced over her lifetime, many written specifically for children and Sunday school use.
The hymn's opening verses retell Luke 2's familiar account of Bethlehem having 'no room' for Christ's birth, but each verse then pivots immediately to a repeated refrain putting the same question of room and welcome directly to the singer's own heart in the present. Its later verses carry that same movement through the rest of Christ's earthly life, His homelessness, His journey to the cross, and on to His promised return, closing with His own invitation, 'Yet there is room, there is room at My side for thee.'
That structural move, from historical narrative to present personal application within the same repeated line, 'there is room in my heart for Thee,' gives the hymn an unusually direct evangelistic edge compared to more purely narrative Christmas hymns.
Its central contrast, between Christ's original 'kingly crown' and the humble circumstances of His actual birth, echoes a common theme across many Christmas hymns, but Elliott's version stays especially close to concrete, specific detail, the throne left behind, the room denied.
Elliott worked for much of her career on hymn collections specifically intended for children and for use with the sick and infirm, and her writing consistently favored plain, direct language over more elaborate poetic or theological complexity.
The hymn is commonly set to MARGARET, a tune composed by Timothy R. Matthews in 1876, whose gentle, singable melody suited the hymn's use in exactly the children's and Sunday school settings Elliott wrote much of her work for.
The hymn remained a favorite specifically for children's Christmas services and Sunday schools, valued for translating the Nativity's historical question of room and welcome into something a child could understand and personally answer for themselves.
