The shepherds went in haste to Bethlehem and found Mary and Joseph,
and the infant lying in the manger.
How unusual were the choices of to whom the angels communicated the good news about the birth of the messiah. In the first place, the parents themselves were by no means obvious candidates, though they were in fact qualified by their connection to the Davidic line. Nevertheless, their lives had no appearance indicative of this royal lineage. They were apparently poor and unknown in the wider world. After them, the first people who were told were shepherds, also likely without wealth or influence. It was not the great men of the age who were sent to witness the birth of the savior. But it did make a certain kind of sense. It brought to mind the fact that David himself had been called from watching the flock of his father Jesse in order to become king. This was fitting since the Lord called David to "be shepherd of my people" (see Second Samuel 5:2). The prophets had long critiques subsequent kings and leaders for the failure to act as shepherds, serving themselves rather than the sheep. God promised that he himself would shepherd his people (see Ezekiel 34:15), and would also send shepherds after his own heart (see Jeremiah 3:15). And in Jesus these promises were finally in the process of being fulfilled. Thus it was appropriate for his birth to be witnessed, not first by great men or worldly kings, but by other shepherds. We know they were not chosen because their testimony would make the story any more persuasive. Imagine trying to describe this birth to one unfamiliar with the story. Their vision of angels would be just as quickly discounted as Mary or Joseph insisting on the supernatural way the birth came about. This, is not, probably how most of us would have written the story. It seemed that God was intentionally handicapping the ease with which he could raise this child to the throne of David. Yet there was a reason that an obscure birth was appropriate. God was beginning the work of casting down the mighty from their thrones and lifting up the lowly. A great reversal was taking place, after which, power could no longer be separated from service or from love. The very fact of the shepherds as first witnesses bore witness to this truth.
All who heard it were amazed
by what had been told them by the shepherds.
God had and would continue to choose unlikely individuals to proclaim the good news to the world. He choose the weak in the world to shame the strong, and those who count for nothing to bring to nothing those highly accounted by the world (see First Corinthians 1:26-28). Among the first of these were the shepherds who were so transformed by their experience that people must have been able to tell that something unusual had happened. This change that the visit of the angels begun in them was apparently sufficiently distant from who they were previously that people who heard them speak of it couldn't help but be "amazed". So it was probably not them or their words so much as the transformation God himself accomplished in them that spoke for itself. We may hope this is true for us as well, so that we, who are by no means trained professionals, nor practiced in the art of persuasion, can still make known the amazing things the Lord has done.
And Mary kept all these things,
reflecting on them in her heart.
Even to Mary the full meaning of the circumstances of her life were not immediately obvious to her. She knew that God was with her in the circumstances of her life, but also knew that he didn't always provide an explanation for why certain things happened as they did. We may imagine that even for her it would have been comforting to have more definite knowledge of what these events meant and of the future that was beginning to take shape for her son. Rather than resenting the unknown she remained open. Rather than ignoring the unknown, she remained present to it until its meaning eventually became evident. As an aside, it is interesting to note that this statement that she reflected on these things was meant to indicate how Luke himself came to learn about them.
Then the shepherds returned,
glorifying and praising God
for all they had heard and seen,
just as it had been told to them.
The shepherds, apparently, returned to their flocks, and to business as usual, the daily grind. But they were not the same after as they were before. Even the transitory involvement in the life of Jesus, an involvement the value of which was difficult to quantify, was something that they would treasure from that point on. In many ways God has accomplished more in our own lives through Jesus than he did in those of the shepherds. But are we moved to give him glory of praise as the shepherds did? If not, it may be that we need to learn from Mary how to keep all that the Lord did for us, reflecting on it, until we realize how great a treasure it is.
Matt Maher - Hope For Everyone
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