Shepherds, Really?

Today’s Thought

We have brutally abused and distorted this simple scene with our modern nativity renditions. I remember being in church or watching on television reenactments of the nativity with these wise old shepherds who understood God deeply as they journeyed into the small village of Bethlehem to see the Christ child. It just didn’t happen that way. We’ve missed the message of the story and the way the Father chose to announce his Son’s not so grand entrance.

Shepherds…in Jesus’s day were usually prepubescent girls around 8-10 years old not grizzly old men who understood the depths of biblical truth. The angel came to little girls who were sent to watch dad’s little flock—little girls, eight, nine, maybe ten years old. Wow! Why did our father do it this way? In a culture that marginalized women and especially little girls, our father sent his angel, probably Gabriel, to a group of little girls out in the fields with a bunch of smelly, wandering sheep. God sent his grand announcement to the most overlooked and dismissed of society. These are the ones he would speak to for in his son’s emerging Kingdom, there are NO marginalized…there are none looked down upon…there are none who are on the outside looking in…for even the weakest are loved, desired, and welcomed at the father’s table. In fact, the most marginalized and overlooked of Jesus’s world became the first to declare that the Son of Man was born. Father chose and used those all others never even saw!

And the declaration of the Angel? “Don’t fear ever again, for I bring you good news”…oh, how we need good news! Do we really preach good news in the church any longer or just more expectations from a God we can never seem to please? “…of great joy that will be for all…” Jesus IS the good news and he has come to bring great joy. But maybe the best part of this grand announcement of the coming of the Son of God to these little girls was …Jesus and this emerging kingdom is for ALL the people. The Jewish leaders had created a massive caste system which made the masses feel that God was NOT for them, and they could never really get to him. But the good news...he is for all.

When they arrived in this minuscule village, they found a scene utterly unfit for the glorious King of Heaven. They found a tiny, wriggling baby lying in a watering trough surrounded by the sounds of goats, sheep and chickens. They found a mere girl and her teenage husband filled with both wonder and fear. They found a defenseless little human wrapped in a swaddling cloth–the cloth given by the priest to every couple as they approach marriage to wrap their first lamb in for their first sacrificial offering unto the Almighty. Could the Lamb of God be wrapped in anything else? What a sight—how simple, how obscure, how approachable, how marvelously plain. What is this kingdom and who is this king? It’s Christmas. That’s what it is!

Think It Over

• Why would the Father send his mighty angel to a bunch of little girls?
• Have you ever really pondered the depths of good news in this announcement?
• What was the meaning of Jesus being wrapped in a lamb’s swaddling cloth lying in the manger?

Let’s Pray

Oh, great Father, open our eyes and hearts all over again this Christmas. Let us perceive the depths of each facet of this Christmas story, and let it change the very way we see you, the way we see Jesus, the way we understand his kingdom. Let us see the marginalized like you, and value and love and reach out to them bringing them into the inner circle of your heart and your kingdom realm. Open our eyes to see in Jesus’s wonderful name. Amen.