On the cover of the Christian Century magazine two years ago, there was a delightful and very different Nativity scene. Joseph and Mary, dressed as Latin American peasants, are off to one side, while dominating the scene are a throng of shepherds and black-faced sheep, all crowding in around the glowing manger. Shepherds? Well, if you listened carefully to Luke’s story of the birth of Jesus, you noticed that the shepherds are the first humans with speaking parts. But shepherds? Why would shepherds camping out with their sheep be important players in this story?1 Theirs was a rough and dirty life, especially when they were out with the sheep. No way to get clean or do laundry or get rid of the smell of the sheep: no showers or bathtubs, no concentrated detergent, no hot water, unless they built a fire to heat it themselves, no running water unless they camped by a river. So when these shepherds reached Mary and Joseph they probably smelled strongly of sheep, wood smoke, and garlic from that day’s meal. Their clothes were probably torn and musty from the caves and tents that they usually slept in. Most of them were probably boys ranging in age from eight to fourteen, with a few grown men to generally keep guard. The older boys would be learning how to shear, butcher, and perhaps sell sheep, so the hardest, dirtiest part of the job of raising sheep was left to the younger boys. And yet here they came, these dirty, scruffy, street-smart kids. By some miracle, they had a vision of angels, and they left the sheep with a couple of bigger boys and ran pell-mell into the village. Pushing, shoving, maybe making wisecracks, they crowded in to see a teenage girl cradling a baby. What a scene! Did God really send God’s Son and God’s own messengers to these folks?
What an unlikely story. It’s true that King David, the ancestor of God’s anointed one, was a shepherd, and that Israel’s kings were often called shepherds. But really. Angels announcing the birth of the anointed one to those scruffy kids? And it’s true that one of the prophecies had said that the Messiah was to be born in Bethlehem. But really. That tiny, poor village whose main source of income was the bread it sent up to Herod’s towering palace? And it’s true that we heard only last week how an angel had told another poor no-account teenager that she was to give birth to the savior of the world. But really. It would be as if the savior of the world were born in a homeless shelter or a truck stop. Wouldn’t the world’s savior have been delivered by a trained midwife in a rich well-appointed place? Wouldn’t the first people to hear that he was born be wealthy, well educated folks? Yes, God seems to have a preference, especially in Luke’s way of telling the story, for poor, down at the heels people, even for women. But really. Luke’s story is all so unlikely.
Actually, maybe the whole story is unlikely. The Word made flesh, God coming to us in a human body, the all-powerful God becoming totally powerless, totally dependent on poor, working class people. As Madeleine L’Engle said, “Cribbed, cabined, and confined within the contours of a human infant. The infinite defined by the finite? The Creator of all life thirsty and abandoned? Why would [God] do such a thing? Aren’t there easier ways for God to redeem … fallen creatures?” Can we really believe that God comes down to us, into the midst of “civil wars, demonstrations, conspiracies, and petty fights,” into a body as frail and intricate as ours?"2 And the child growing up to be a refugee, a working man with dusty feet, a man who would radically challenge and transform the world around him. The adult Jesus fulfilling his promise to feed us with his own body and blood, so that we might be his Body in the world. The holy one breaking into our world again and again and again. It is an unlikely story, even a ridiculous story, a mystery that we celebrate this day. Indeed, the whole Incarnation, the coming of God in history in human flesh is still as much a mystery today as the incomprehensible nature of God.
Do we just stop right there? Do we sit awestruck, open-mouthed, rooted to our pews in the face of such mystery? Of course, in one sense, awestruck silence is the right response. But maybe God hopes for something more of us. Maybe we need to look again at those angels and shepherds. Maybe we need to hear again the heavenly choir belting out, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace for people whom he favors.” Are those angels really saying that through the birth of this holy child, who is the Messiah, that all people will enjoy God’s gracious favor, and that the world will know peace?
If so, then we need to respond to that proclamation of grace! And this story suggests there are three ways we can do that. First, we can imitate the angels. We can join the heavenly choir in their singing out of God’s glory. We too can offer praise and thanks to God for God’s great gift of God’s son, indeed for all of God’s gifts to us. We can do that in our own individual prayers, as we travel through our days. What’s more important, we can offer our praise and thanks to God through regularly joining in worship with others, through hearing God’s Word in Scripture and joining ourselves more firmly to Christ’s Body in the Eucharist. Second, we can imitate the shepherds. We too can obey the angelic summons and go to seek Jesus wherever he may be found. We too can glorify and praise God for all that we have heard and seen. We can heed the angels by seeking and serving Christ in all people and by sharing with others not only our material goods but, what is more important, the good news of what Christ has done for us and for the world. And we can heed the angels by actively seeking to spread God’s peace in our world, a world as brutal and warring as that of the shepherds. And third we can imitate Mary. We hear no words from Mary in this story, but Luke tells us that, “Mary kept all these things to herself, holding them dear, deep within herself.” When the presents are all opened, the Christmas dinner is finished, the last guests have left, and the house is quiet again, perhaps we too can reflect on the glorious announcement, perhaps we too can savor its wonder in our own hearts. Praise, share, reflect. That’s what our life as Jesus’ disciples is all about.
“Angels we have heard on high.” Together with those scruffy boys, we too have heard the angels. Lord, grant us the grace to join them in saying to ourselves and others, “Come to Bethlehem and see him whose birth the angels sing.”
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1. The description of the shepherds is based on Sandra Herrmann, “Shepherds Camping in the Neighborhood,” Lectionary Tales for the Pulpit, (Lima, OH: CSS, 2011), 26-7.
2. Julie Polter, “’Say, Say the Light,’” Sojourners, December 2011, 9.
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