In the same region there were some shepherds staying out in the fields and keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord suddenly stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terribly frightened.”
Luke 2: 8-9
I felt reluctant to put this Bible verse at the top of this devotion for the simple reason that you will probably read it quickly, skim over the words and likely think, ‘Oh yes, I know that passage. What else shall I read?’ Why do I know that? Because I have done the same. In fact, I opened my Bible to consider what to study this morning and when I saw it (about the birth of Jesus), there were two thoughts: firstly, surely we should only look at this passage during the traditional Christmas festival and secondly, this passage is so familiar, shouldn’t I study an alternative passage to learn from God?
Angel and shepherds … we think about school or church nativity plays, children dressed in woolly long robes holding sticks with cuddly toy lambs… dramatic offerings to the wider, indifferent world, which almost lean into pantomimes or parodies, revisitations in the festive season of a well-known story almost mired in a sense of myth.
However, this isn’t a myth but a historical event and the Lord drew me to two points to reflect upon, perhaps to counter the two assumptions I’ve noted above. Firstly, why did the angel appear to these shepherds? I mean why this particular group of men and no one else at that moment? God never does anything without a reason. Secondly, look at their reaction to the angel appearing. They aren’t smiling and jumping up and down at this point. These men are shaken to the core of their beings, “terribly frightened” as the Bible puts it. This is an abnormal event, which literally turns their everyday lives upside down.
Artist Charlie Mackesey once made the excellent point in an Alpha course sermon that these shepherds were outcasts and rough men: dirty, smelling and possibly prone to language not likely to be approved within polite society. Yet the Lord has entered the world to offer salvation through Jesus to such people: to shepherds, and lost souls like you and me. As He later said himself (Mark 2:17): “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
This first angelic appearance is a powerfully visible statement, I believe, to the entire world, that He has come to save those who are wandering pointlessly in their lives, burdened with sin and needing his love. In fact, later in Luke 2, this is exactly what the angel tells the shepherds, that the Saviour has been born for them personally, as well as “all the people.” The angel says to them: “… there has been born for you a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord.”
The second point about the shepherds being “terribly frightened” is a reminder that this isn’t a twee myth to be replicated as a near-parody by schoolchildren, although we all enjoy seeing such low key theatrical productions. I have written before about my own encounters with the Living God, with an emphasis on the living part. These experiences of the divine are both wonderful and overwhelming, and simply never to be forgotten. They mark the difference between meaningless religion and integral belief born from meeting the real Creator.
So we can hardly imagine what it must have been like for these shepherds to watch an army of angels appearing out of heaven and singing the praises of God!
And of course, the ultimate intention was for them to not receive fear but love. Our last glimpse of these chosen men is seeing them return from meeting the baby Jesus, forever changed from the divine encounter.
“The shepherds went back, glorifying and praising God for all that they had heard and seen…”
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