(This sermon is a first-person sermon that I preached for Christmas. A first-person sermon is a sermon in which the preacher speaks from the viewpoint of one of the characters in the story. In this sermon, I was speaking as one of the shepherds in Luke 2:1-20).
Good morning to all of you! I’m so excited to be here with you at Christmastime to have the opportunity to tell you about what I experienced back on that first Christmas day. I know that many of you have probably heard about my story before from reading it in the Bible, but hopefully I can help you understand what took place just a little better.
I always enjoy every opportunity that I get to think back on the events of that day. The whole story is so extraordinary, I’m not sure I would have believed it if I hadn’t been part of it. God sure works in funny ways sometimes!
Let me get right down to the events of that Christmas night. My relatives and I were pasturing our flocks out in the fields surrounding Bethlehem. I did a little research on your area before I came today and I discovered that Bethlehem at that time was about the size of a town east of here called Pratt. Its claim to fame was that it was the hometown of King David, and that connection certainly played into the events of that first Christmas.
The whole area was chaotic on that day because of all the people who had travelled to Bethlehem to register for the Roman census. Most of my people resented Rome and its census, and especially the taxes that went along with all of it. We had a rather uneasy peace with Rome at that time. They had controlled our land for several decades, but they did keep things peaceful in our area, and they let us practice our own religion. Their puppet-king, Herod, even made some beautiful renovations to our Temple in Jerusalem. That was all better treatment than my people had received under the Greeks, but we still longed for our freedom.
Anyway, on that first Christmas there were probably three times as many people as normal in Bethlehem, and we had heard from some travelers that all of the inns in town were full. People were getting shelter anywhere they could find it. It was quite a scene, but for us shepherds, it was a fairly ordinary day. We were settling down for the night, and we certainly didn’t expect any excitement. Shepherding was usually a fairly boring job. Just imagine if you never built fences for your cattle, and instead you had to sit in the field all day and make sure none of them wandered off! The hours passed by pretty slowly at times, so many of us played music to pass the time. Many of us had a flute, or even a lyre, which was a small, stringed instrument. I like to think that I could have played the flute for any king west of the Euphrates—not that a shepherd like me would ever get to meet a king!
That night we were taking turns on watch through the night hours, and during my watch, there was a moment all of a sudden where I was surrounded by a brilliant light. It was like the sun had risen in the middle of the night, and in the same instant I saw a being in front of me. I had never seen an angel before, but I had heard the descriptions of them from the holy men in the Scriptures, so I knew this had to be one of the Lord’s messengers. My relatives had woken up from the light, and we were all terrified! What did this angel want with us?
But quickly after he appeared, the angel spoke to us and said, “Do not be afraid; for behold, I bring you good news of great joy which will be for all the people.” He had come in peace, and he had come to speak to us with a message of great joy for our people! But why hadn’t God sent him to the Pharisees or the Sanhedrin? Why was this angel here to talk to a bunch of shepherds?
You see, people didn’t have a very high opinion of us at that time. We took great pride in our work, but honestly it didn’t take extraordinary skill. You didn’t need much education or training to be a shepherd, so people weren’t exactly impressed with us. Oftentimes, people would give their children the job of watching the sheep. You might remember that King David was the youngest of all his brothers, and what job did they tell him to do? Watch the sheep! It was a job given to those who weren’t thought to be capable of much else.
Not only that, but the religious leaders like the Pharisees really didn’t think much of us because we couldn’t follow all of the traditions that they said were necessary for obeying the Law of Moses. How could we carefully wash our hands before eating while we were out in the field? How could we avoid diseased things when we had to care for our sick animals? We couldn’t follow their traditions, so they declared us “unclean” and wouldn’t let us participate in worship at the Temple.
I guess they had forgotten that some of the greatest heroes of our nation were shepherds! I already mentioned King David, and there was Moses, too! He was a shepherd when God called him to return to Egypt. The prophet Amos was a shepherd, too. Not only that, but the Lord in the Scriptures called Himself a shepherd for His people!
But none of that mattered—people still didn’t think very highly of us, but that was okay. Still though, I can’t figure out why God would send His angel to announce this news to us! We were pretty insignificant in society. God sure works in funny ways sometimes! I guess it all reminds me of what our brother Paul wrote in his letter to our brothers and sisters in Corinth: “For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God (1 Corinthians 1:26-29 ESV).”
The fact that the angel came to talk to us was pretty amazing, but what he said next was even more incredible! After he greeted us, he said, “today in the city of David there has been born for you a Savior, who is Messiah the Lord.” The Messiah had been born! God had promised for so long to send Him to us, and now He was here! God had spoken of Him so many times through the holy men of old. Many years before, our father Jacob had said to his son Judah, “The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until he comes to whom it belongs; the nations will obey him (Genesis 49:10 NET).” And then God spoke to King David through the prophet Nathan and said, “When your days are complete and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your descendant after you, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for My name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever (2 Samuel 7:12–13 NASB).” And then Isaiah the prophet said, “a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us; And the government will rest on His shoulders; And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace, On the throne of David and over his kingdom, To establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness From then on and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will accomplish this (Isaiah 9:6-7 NASB).” And then the prophet Zechariah spoke of a time of trouble for Jerusalem, but he said “In that day [the Lord’s] feet will stand on the Mount of Olives…and the Lord, my God, will come, and all the holy ones with Him…and the Lord will be king over all the earth; in that day that Lord will be the only one, and His name the only one (Zechariah 14:4a, 5b, 9 NASB).”
We had been waiting so long for God’s chosen One, the Messiah, to come, and now, the angel said, he had been born! And then the angel said, “This will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a feeding trough.” Yes, yes, okay—so first we find this baby in a feeding trough, and then where do we find the Messiah? But then it dawned on me—the baby in the feeding trough IS the Messiah!!! Wow! God sure works in funny ways sometimes!
What is the Messiah doing lying in a feeding trough? He is to be the king over all nations, and is this how He is born into the world? I’ll bet King Herod was wrapped in Egyptian cotton when he was born, but a manger, for the MESSIAH!? And what kind of family was he born into? They didn’t even have enough money to pay someone to open their home to a pregnant woman!? I know there were a lot of travelers in town, but a little bit of money will open some space pretty quickly! I guess what our brother Paul wrote to the Corinthians really was true: “you know the grace of our Lord Jesus the Messiah, that though he was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich (2 Corinthians 8:9 NASB).”
And how is it that we should see the Messiah as a little baby? We knew from the Scriptures that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2), but none of us expected to see Him as a little baby! Our rabbis told us that no one would know who He was until He burst onto the scene as a victorious conqueror. We were told that He would live in hiding until He was ready to reveal Himself, and then on one glorious day, He would reveal Himself with miracles and defeat all of our enemies with one fell swoop, and then set up His kingdom. How was it, then, that we could see Him as a little baby and meet His family? This really confused some of my people later on, after Jesus began to preach. They said of Him, “we know where this man is from; but whenever the Messiah may come, no one knows where He is from (John 7:27 NASB).” At least, that’s the way that people expected it to happen.
Well, it didn’t take us long to decide to go and see this Child. We made our way quickly to Bethlehem and checked the stables until we found this young couple with their baby swaddled and lying in a feeding trough. What a surprise that was! There was certainly nothing royal about this family, nothing stately or majestic. They were just a travel-weary young couple trying to make do with a new baby in a barn! God sure works in funny ways sometimes!
And the Child! There was nothing different about Him. I don’t know what I expected, but I guess I just thought He might be different somehow. But we knew all that the angel had told us, and we believed it. There was a small crowd that had gathered there, and we told them everything that the angels had told us. They were all very excited, but the boy’s mother just remained kind of quiet. She seemed to be glad that we had come, but you could tell she was just thinking about all of this. What a thing to wrap your mind around—that your child was the Messiah!
We stayed as long as we could, but we did have to get back to our sheep, so after a little while we went back to the field, but as you can imagine we didn’t get much sleep that night. We kept talking about all of these things and praising God for everything that He had allowed us to see and hear. I think the feelings of everyone involved with that first Christmas were summed up well by the Child’s relative, Zacharias, when he said through the Holy Spirit: “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, For He has visited us and accomplished redemption for His people, And has raised up a horn of salvation for us In the house of David His servant--As He spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from of old--Salvation FROM OUR ENEMIES, And FROM THE HAND OF ALL WHO HATE US; To show mercy toward our fathers, And to remember His holy covenant, The oath which He swore to Abraham our father, To grant us that we, being rescued from the hand of our enemies, Might serve Him without fear, In holiness and righteousness before Him all our days. [He will] give to His people the knowledge of salvation By the forgiveness of their sins, Because of the tender mercy of our God, With which the Sunrise from on high will visit us, TO SHINE UPON THOSE WHO SIT IN DARKNESS AND THE SHADOW OF DEATH, To guide our feet into the way of peace (Luke 1:68-79 NASB).”
Every time I think about that first Christmas, the thought that comes to my mind is this—God kept His promise! He sure worked in some funny ways, but He did what He said He would do. That’s the lesson that I will always take away from Christmas.
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