“And there were shepherds in the fields in that region.”
It has always struck me, “Why is it that the angels came to shepherds?
Why was it that shepherds were the first ones to see Christ the Lord.
Why not Kings?
Why not royalty?
Why was Jesus not born in a palace if he was the King?
Or come to religious leaders who were expecting him?
Why did God choose this particular way to be born among us?”
According to the gospel of Luke who we hear from tonight,
there is a deliberate reason for this.
Luke book-ends his gospel with tonight’s passage,
at the beginning of his gospel,
where Jesus is first known by
the lowliest of those in society, the shepherds.
Shepherds would not even have gone to the census in Bethlehem
because they were not counted.
They were the lowest on the social order;
they would have been on the outside, not even counted.
Yet, Jesus is first known by them.
Then at the very end of the book of this gospel,
Luke has the resurrected Jesus,
now coming back and appearing not to his male disciples
and not even to the religious leaders,
but rather he appears to the women.
Again, they would have been considered the lowly.
They would have been not recognized and
yet he appears to them in the risen state
and tells them to tell the male disciples to go back to Galilee
where they first fell in love with Jesus.
Go back to where you first fell in love.
Those two bookends give us some markers as to
why Jesus came among us as an infant.
He came to the lowly.
Three things to come to mind here.
First of all, throughout the entire of Luke’s gospel,
God is a God of surprises.
God does not follow our expectations.
He goes beyond any expectations that we have ever, ever set for him.
Pope Francis has said this over and over again,
that God is a God of surprises;
that he is more loving, more merciful, more tender than
we could ever imagine and that he surprises us in life.
One of those surprises is that he appears to this group of shepherds.
Second insight is that the shepherds were humble.
They did not have any expectations
that the angels would come to them;
that God would come to them;
they had no sort of rightful position or heir to it.
They were able, because of their humility,
to simply accept this message from the angels
and then abide by the message.
They were to go to Bethlehem and
discover this infant wrapped in swaddling clothes in a manger.
And they do.
That humility easily opens them to God’s word
and easily obedient to God’s word.
It seems to me that if an angel appeared to you or me,
we would start to wonder
if we did not have a little bit too much to drink;
if something was wrong or we would quickly explain it away.
“Oh the cloud formation was there.
I do not know quite what happened.
I heard something.”
We would rationalize away.
And if we were in a position of power and authority,
who knows what way we would react to it?
If we were simple shepherds with no expectations
then we would just accept it as a gift;
and we would obey what we have been given.
The third thing is the shepherds see and observe the baby Jesus
who is born as a Messiah and they then were able to proclaim it
to everyone with the greatest of ease.
Again, I wonder if we had an extraordinary spiritual experience,
and I suspect many of you have,
we often would keep it to ourselves
because we would not want others to think of us as being strange.
We do not want others to, well, think differently of us.
We hold onto it and we do not share
this wonderful, spiritual experience that we have.
But not so the shepherds because they were not worried
about what other people thought about them.
They experienced.
They obeyed.
They experienced the Son of God and
they shared that wonderful news for all to hear.
We are called to be like those shepherds;
to be humble and not think we know it all;
and not to over-rationalize how God works in our world.
But to accept how God might work in our world;
to listen and then to obey.
Then to testify to what we have experienced.
It sounds so simple but the challenge is that well,
we can get very full of ourselves.
We think we know what life is all about.
We think we have it all figured out.
If we have ever had it all figured out up until 2020,
I have a funny feeling that we now know we do not have it figured out;
that a simple little virus can shut down
the whole world in a matter of weeks.
And we are still now months later still trying to grapple with it.
By the grace of science, ingenuity and God’s grace,
we will overcome this but we need to be more humble.
We need to not pretend we have all the answers
and instead look to experience the message of this night
that God is the light of the world
who comes in the midst of our darkness;
that the little child represents God’s incredible love for us;
that God so loved the world that he became one of us to show us the way.
How do we overcome this stubbornness?
Let me give you an example which I think might help.
My friend is a teacher and
he is currently teaching a 6th grade science class.
He loves teaching because they have this curiosity
but every now and then a group of kids
think they have all the answers.
He was explaining a new app
that was going to show some really kind of cool things
but you have to figure it out.
He had two groups of kids.
The first group of kids say,
“No. No. No. We got this Mr. D. We got this.
We got this. Don’t worry. No. No. We got it.”
And they went off but they actually didn’t know
how to fully use the app and they got frustrated.
The second group, they did not pretend to know.
They sat with him and listened to the tips for this particular app
that allowed them to unlock the secret;
to unlock the hidden part of this app
when it came alive and became three dimensional
and all sorts of cool things.
In the interim, the first group were complaining.
“Ah, this app doesn’t work.
The Wi-Fi doesn’t work.
It’s not doing what it is meant to do.”
They were complaining about what they had
and not how they approached what they had.
A lot of us end up in this first group.
We complain about life and
we don’t listen like this second group
to the Lord who is trying to tell us;
like the shepherds;
to listen, to come, obey and experience.
And after you experience then to share the message to all.
How are we to apply this to our life?
The message of tonight is that the light of Christ
shines in the midst of the darkness;
that is what these beautiful readings tell us;
that he comes and shines;
that we are in the darkness and sometimes we do not understand.
And sometimes we struggle with life and darkness creeps in
but Christ is always there to shine his light.
We do not try to pretend we have all the answers.
We humbly come before God and to Christ and experience him.
The reality is that Christ is already here among us
and if we are not experiencing Christ
then we are in the darkness and it is our issue
that we are not experiencing him.
We are not opening our eyes to him.
We have to become like these kids in the second group
and like the shepherds and be humble.
We go to our God and we ask,
“Lord, show me your presence.
Show me where you are in my children,
in my parents,
in my spouse
and the love of my spouse and
maybe my grandparents or my community.
Lord, show me where you are already present.
Help me to experience the Light in the midst of my darkness;
to experience your love.”
The ultimate message of tonight is that simple message:
God so loved the world that he became one of us.
And in becoming one of us,
he blessed our destiny of humanity to become divine;
and him becoming human;
we start the process of becoming divine.
It is not that complicated but we do over complicate it
and over rationalize it because of who we are.
But we can learn a lot from the shepherds,
who are humble and simple;
they simply obey what they have heard.
They experience the love and they share that love with others.
Tonight, this day and this year ahead,
if we could simply be like those shepherds
allowing the Lord to teach us;
to be humble before the Lord and ask,
“Lord, teach me the tips of life.
Unlock the secret of life.
Let me experience your love in my heart
and then help me to spread that love to others.”
That is what tonight is about:
The Light in the midst of the darkness;
the love of God that conquers all things
in that Christ is born among us today.
