Advent, Day Twenty-Two

Friday, 20 December: ⁸ And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. ⁹ And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with great fear. Luke 2:8-9

I sat on the floor of our quarters in Kaiserslautern, Germany, listening to the odd buzz of our green DBP phone. Eventually, my mother answered and in the echoey transatlantic phone call, I shared the joyous news of the birth of our son, Christopher. Parents enjoy breaking such happy news. Today, many seek out some way of letting the world know in a cool, or hip, video posted on some social-media platform. But, God chose a different way. He found some shepherds out in the fields. Unlike the rest of the world, He did not look down upon the shepherds for their lowly status. Perhaps, just perhaps, He identified with them. After all, in scripture, God frequently refers to Himself as a shepherd. While Herod and the other beautiful people of the first-century Roman world slept soundly, God chose to ring up some scruffy shepherds and share with them the good news of the birth of Jesus.