ANGELS AND SHEPHERDS #3/4

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Quote from Forum Archives on January 20, 2009, 8:39 am
Posted by: bhfbc <bhfbc@...>
ANGELS AND SHEPHERDS #3/4

A SPIRITUAL CHRISTMAS

December 28, 2008

TEXT: Luke 2:8-20

On the first two Sundays in Advent, I have spoken about angels. Angels were sent as messengers to announce the birth of the Messiah in fulfillment of hundreds of years of prophecy. Angels also praised and worshiped God for His compassionate act of salvation. Angels played vital roles during that first Christmas, but they were not the only ones who proclaimed the birth of the newborn King. As todays Scripture selection gives away, there were some pretty plain folk shepherds who were also given a responsibility to make known the birth of the promised Messiah.

Before we look at what the shepherds did, lets look at who the shepherds were. From the Israels history, we are familiar with some important Biblical people who were shepherds at some point in their life. Abraham tended flocks, as did Isaac, then Jacob, then his twelve sons. After fleeing from Egypt, Moses tended his father-in-laws flocks. While a boy in the household of his father, Jesse, David watched the sheep. All of these families also had other servants who also watched the flocks, but throughout that time, shepherding was such an honorable vocation that the owners of the sheep and their sons worked as shepherds.

By the time of the birth of Jesus, though, the structure of society had changed. The sheep industry was still important in Israel, but the actual tending of the flocks was regarded as menial labor to be avoided by those able to have better means. Those who owned a large number of sheep hired others to watch the flocks. Such a job was beneath their dignity. Shepherds were simple men with simple lives who were not known for powerful intellect or high society manners.

Even more surprising, shepherds were considered ceremonially unclean. What that meant was that shepherds were excluded from normal worship. The greatest irony here is that the sheep around the Jerusalem area, which included Bethlehem, were raised primarily as the sacrificial lambs used in worship. In fact, one source notes that in the first century, more than 250,000 sheep were offered annually as sacrifices at the festival of Passover alone. (Bill Crowder, Angels & Shepherds, RBC Ministries, 2008, p. 19) So these shepherds of Bethlehem were responsible for raising and delivering healthy, unblemished sheep to be offered at the altar of sacrifice for the atonement of sin, but the shepherds were prevented from worshiping in the assembly because of their contact with the animals during their birth and their contact with dead bodies when disposing of dead lambs. This may not make sense to us, but that is just one of the typical results of a legalistic religious system. In addition to the laws rendering them ceremonially unclean, shepherds were required to stay constantly with their flocks. They were unable to leave their duties for days or weeks at a time, thus preventing them from going to the temple so that they could be properly cleansed for religious worship. For the most part, first century shepherds were not the kind of folk who would receive an invitation to see a king.

And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks by night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger. So much for shepherds not receiving invitations to see a king. These shepherds not only received a first-class invitation, they saw the glory of the Lord. And not only did they see the glory of the Lord, those lowly shepherds were the first citizens to see the glory of the Lord in Israel in about 600 years! We have to return to the prophet Ezekiel for the last time that the Bible tells us that the glory of the Lord was shown in Israel. Ever since their release from captivity in Egypt, the people of Israel were blessed with the presence of God in their midst. But they began to stray. They became idolatrous and immoral. They corrupted Gods house with pagan idols. They dishonored His name. Even though God continued to reach out to His people and there were moments when they repented and returned to God they largely continued to reject Him. Finally, in the day of Ezekiel, the glory of the Lord departed step by step from the temple, then from Jerusalem, then, ultimately, from the people of Israel. The final blow is delivered in Ezekiel 11:22: Then the cherubim, with the wheels beside them, spread their wings, and the glory of the God of Israel was above them. The glory of the Lord went up from within the city and stopped above the mountain east of it. In other words, God left. The few remaining references to the glory of the Lord found in the Old Testament point to the future, with no expression of Gods presence among His people. Keep in mind that the order of the Old Testament books in our Bible is not chronological. Ezekiel is among the later Old Testament books. For roughly 600 years, the glory of the Lord was absent from Israel. No wonder John wrote, The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it. (John 1:5)

Then, after some 600 years of absence, the glory of the Lord shone once again in Israel to a bunch of nameless shepherds who were religiously unclean and were considered by many in Israel to be pretty much nobodies. Separated from the religious system that they helped support, the shepherds were required to look elsewhere for hope. That night, hope found them. That night, the glory of the Lord was revealed not in the throne room of Israels Roman governor or in the temple served by Israels priests, but in a field near Bethlehem to a bunch of rough, crude, unkempt shepherds. Dr. Larry Richards, Christian author and educator, comments that in spite of what society taught, the shepherds were uniquely equipped to be the recipients of this remarkable privilege: The Savior, who was now born and lying in the quiet manger, was to be the Lamb of God. And as the Lamb, He was destined to die for the sins of the world. To die for these very shepherds as their Savior. Perhaps shepherds, who cared for young lambs, who sat through dark, cold nights in the fields to guard and protect their flocks, might understand the shepherds heart of God the Father, might glimpse what it meant for Him to give His one Lamb for all. (from Bill Crowder, Angels & Shepherds, p. 26) On the night of the birth of the newborn King, the glory of the Lord returned to Israel shown to a bunch of lowly shepherds in a field near Bethlehem.

This is where I make my connection between the title of this mornings choir anthem, A Spiritual Christmas, and the shepherds experience about 2,000 years ago. Would they, like their ancestors before, harden their hearts and reject the return of the glory of the Lord, or would they receive the revelation with joy, celebrate with praise and worship, and testify to others what they had seen and heard? Would they make this evening a spiritual Christmas?

As always, the responsibility to receive the glory of the Lord lies with those to whom it is revealed. We may logically think that those shepherds, after having been shone the glory of God and hearing the angels announcement and then witnessing a great company of heavenly host praising God, would have no choice but to receive the glory of the Lord. In truth, though, they very well could have rejected God. Quite a number of people throughout the Bible witnessed some amazing things and yet continued to sin. Throughout the wilderness journey to the Promised Land, the Israelites had the glory of the Lord perpetually in front of them. Yet, they failed to act with faith many times, the final straw being when they refused to take possession of the land that God showed them. Throughout his ministry among man, Jesus displayed extraordinary wisdom and performed miracles. Yet, religious leaders, government officials, and others rejected him as Savior. The responsibility to receive the glory of the Lord and to believe lies with those to whom it is revealed.

That night, the shepherds celebrated a spiritual Christmas. When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, Lets go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about. So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger. (Luke 2:15) They accepted their responsibility, believed, and acted on their belief. In fact, they hurried off to see for themselves what the angel declared. We are not told in the Bible anything about how the shepherds acted when they arrived at the stable. All of our nativity scenes show the shepherds in various postures of humble worship, and it makes logical sense that they would have worshiped in some manner the newborn King. After all, the angel announced to them that this baby in a manger was the Savior. He was the Christ, or Messiah, which means the Anointed One. Anointed by whom? Anointed by God. So the shepherds would have understood from the angels announcement that the Promised One that they had heard about from their childhood to their present was lying in the manger before them. Even though they probably wondered what this all meant, they certainly knew that they were in the presence of the Holy One of Israel that night. Theirs was a spiritual Christmas, indeed.

That was just part one, though. A spiritual Christmas always consists of two parts. Part one is the going to the worship. Part two is the witness. The shepherds were the first humans outside of Joseph and Mary to hear about the Christmas message. Then they were the first ones to tell the Christmas message. When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them. (Luke 2:17-18) Im sure that they were amazed. Probably a few wondered what was really in those water pouches they carried. We are cautioned to not prance around others with a self-righteous attitude, such as drawing unwarranted attention to our fasting or our giving, but we are supposed to be a genuine witness. Like the shepherds, we are supposed to spread the word about the Christ. Our relationship with the Father through the Son is of primary importance, but our testimony is also important. In order for their spiritual Christmas to be complete, the shepherds needed to tell others what they saw and heard. They did that, and others were amazed.

There we have the first spiritual Christmas. Outcast shepherds sitting in some field near Bethlehem became the first men to hear and tell the Christmas story. Thats pretty amazing. Writes commentator Adam Clarke, These simple men, having satisfactory evidence of the truth of the good tidings, and feeling a divine influence upon their own minds, returned to the care of their flocks, glorifying God for what He had shown them, and for the blessedness which they felt What subjects for contemplation! What matter for praise!

The great challenge for us, then, is that we should all have a spiritual Christmas. We should all exalt and worship the newborn King as did the shepherds. When we do this, we can cut through some of the frustration and hassle of a season that has grown increasingly secular and commercial. It is great fun, to be sure, to be able to celebrate Christmas. But it brings us blessings to be able to exalt and worship the One who is Christmas. The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.

Rev. Charles A. Layne

First Baptist Church

PO Box 515

179 W. Broadway

Bunker Hill, IN 46914

765-689-7987

[email protected]

www.bhfirstbaptist.com
-- To unsubscribe, send ANY message to: [email protected]   

Posted by: bhfbc <bhfbc@...>

A SPIRITUAL CHRISTMAS

December 28, 2008

TEXT: Luke 2:8-20

On the first two Sundays in Advent, I have spoken about angels. Angels were sent as messengers to announce the birth of the Messiah in fulfillment of hundreds of years of prophecy. Angels also praised and worshiped God for His compassionate act of salvation. Angels played vital roles during that first Christmas, but they were not the only ones who proclaimed the birth of the newborn King. As todays Scripture selection gives away, there were some pretty plain folk shepherds who were also given a responsibility to make known the birth of the promised Messiah.

Before we look at what the shepherds did, lets look at who the shepherds were. From the Israels history, we are familiar with some important Biblical people who were shepherds at some point in their life. Abraham tended flocks, as did Isaac, then Jacob, then his twelve sons. After fleeing from Egypt, Moses tended his father-in-laws flocks. While a boy in the household of his father, Jesse, David watched the sheep. All of these families also had other servants who also watched the flocks, but throughout that time, shepherding was such an honorable vocation that the owners of the sheep and their sons worked as shepherds.

By the time of the birth of Jesus, though, the structure of society had changed. The sheep industry was still important in Israel, but the actual tending of the flocks was regarded as menial labor to be avoided by those able to have better means. Those who owned a large number of sheep hired others to watch the flocks. Such a job was beneath their dignity. Shepherds were simple men with simple lives who were not known for powerful intellect or high society manners.

Even more surprising, shepherds were considered ceremonially unclean. What that meant was that shepherds were excluded from normal worship. The greatest irony here is that the sheep around the Jerusalem area, which included Bethlehem, were raised primarily as the sacrificial lambs used in worship. In fact, one source notes that in the first century, more than 250,000 sheep were offered annually as sacrifices at the festival of Passover alone. (Bill Crowder, Angels & Shepherds, RBC Ministries, 2008, p. 19) So these shepherds of Bethlehem were responsible for raising and delivering healthy, unblemished sheep to be offered at the altar of sacrifice for the atonement of sin, but the shepherds were prevented from worshiping in the assembly because of their contact with the animals during their birth and their contact with dead bodies when disposing of dead lambs. This may not make sense to us, but that is just one of the typical results of a legalistic religious system. In addition to the laws rendering them ceremonially unclean, shepherds were required to stay constantly with their flocks. They were unable to leave their duties for days or weeks at a time, thus preventing them from going to the temple so that they could be properly cleansed for religious worship. For the most part, first century shepherds were not the kind of folk who would receive an invitation to see a king.

And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks by night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger. So much for shepherds not receiving invitations to see a king. These shepherds not only received a first-class invitation, they saw the glory of the Lord. And not only did they see the glory of the Lord, those lowly shepherds were the first citizens to see the glory of the Lord in Israel in about 600 years! We have to return to the prophet Ezekiel for the last time that the Bible tells us that the glory of the Lord was shown in Israel. Ever since their release from captivity in Egypt, the people of Israel were blessed with the presence of God in their midst. But they began to stray. They became idolatrous and immoral. They corrupted Gods house with pagan idols. They dishonored His name. Even though God continued to reach out to His people and there were moments when they repented and returned to God they largely continued to reject Him. Finally, in the day of Ezekiel, the glory of the Lord departed step by step from the temple, then from Jerusalem, then, ultimately, from the people of Israel. The final blow is delivered in Ezekiel 11:22: Then the cherubim, with the wheels beside them, spread their wings, and the glory of the God of Israel was above them. The glory of the Lord went up from within the city and stopped above the mountain east of it. In other words, God left. The few remaining references to the glory of the Lord found in the Old Testament point to the future, with no expression of Gods presence among His people. Keep in mind that the order of the Old Testament books in our Bible is not chronological. Ezekiel is among the later Old Testament books. For roughly 600 years, the glory of the Lord was absent from Israel. No wonder John wrote, The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it. (John 1:5)

Then, after some 600 years of absence, the glory of the Lord shone once again in Israel to a bunch of nameless shepherds who were religiously unclean and were considered by many in Israel to be pretty much nobodies. Separated from the religious system that they helped support, the shepherds were required to look elsewhere for hope. That night, hope found them. That night, the glory of the Lord was revealed not in the throne room of Israels Roman governor or in the temple served by Israels priests, but in a field near Bethlehem to a bunch of rough, crude, unkempt shepherds. Dr. Larry Richards, Christian author and educator, comments that in spite of what society taught, the shepherds were uniquely equipped to be the recipients of this remarkable privilege: The Savior, who was now born and lying in the quiet manger, was to be the Lamb of God. And as the Lamb, He was destined to die for the sins of the world. To die for these very shepherds as their Savior. Perhaps shepherds, who cared for young lambs, who sat through dark, cold nights in the fields to guard and protect their flocks, might understand the shepherds heart of God the Father, might glimpse what it meant for Him to give His one Lamb for all. (from Bill Crowder, Angels & Shepherds, p. 26) On the night of the birth of the newborn King, the glory of the Lord returned to Israel shown to a bunch of lowly shepherds in a field near Bethlehem.

This is where I make my connection between the title of this mornings choir anthem, A Spiritual Christmas, and the shepherds experience about 2,000 years ago. Would they, like their ancestors before, harden their hearts and reject the return of the glory of the Lord, or would they receive the revelation with joy, celebrate with praise and worship, and testify to others what they had seen and heard? Would they make this evening a spiritual Christmas?

As always, the responsibility to receive the glory of the Lord lies with those to whom it is revealed. We may logically think that those shepherds, after having been shone the glory of God and hearing the angels announcement and then witnessing a great company of heavenly host praising God, would have no choice but to receive the glory of the Lord. In truth, though, they very well could have rejected God. Quite a number of people throughout the Bible witnessed some amazing things and yet continued to sin. Throughout the wilderness journey to the Promised Land, the Israelites had the glory of the Lord perpetually in front of them. Yet, they failed to act with faith many times, the final straw being when they refused to take possession of the land that God showed them. Throughout his ministry among man, Jesus displayed extraordinary wisdom and performed miracles. Yet, religious leaders, government officials, and others rejected him as Savior. The responsibility to receive the glory of the Lord and to believe lies with those to whom it is revealed.

That night, the shepherds celebrated a spiritual Christmas. When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, Lets go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about. So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger. (Luke 2:15) They accepted their responsibility, believed, and acted on their belief. In fact, they hurried off to see for themselves what the angel declared. We are not told in the Bible anything about how the shepherds acted when they arrived at the stable. All of our nativity scenes show the shepherds in various postures of humble worship, and it makes logical sense that they would have worshiped in some manner the newborn King. After all, the angel announced to them that this baby in a manger was the Savior. He was the Christ, or Messiah, which means the Anointed One. Anointed by whom? Anointed by God. So the shepherds would have understood from the angels announcement that the Promised One that they had heard about from their childhood to their present was lying in the manger before them. Even though they probably wondered what this all meant, they certainly knew that they were in the presence of the Holy One of Israel that night. Theirs was a spiritual Christmas, indeed.

That was just part one, though. A spiritual Christmas always consists of two parts. Part one is the going to the worship. Part two is the witness. The shepherds were the first humans outside of Joseph and Mary to hear about the Christmas message. Then they were the first ones to tell the Christmas message. When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them. (Luke 2:17-18) Im sure that they were amazed. Probably a few wondered what was really in those water pouches they carried. We are cautioned to not prance around others with a self-righteous attitude, such as drawing unwarranted attention to our fasting or our giving, but we are supposed to be a genuine witness. Like the shepherds, we are supposed to spread the word about the Christ. Our relationship with the Father through the Son is of primary importance, but our testimony is also important. In order for their spiritual Christmas to be complete, the shepherds needed to tell others what they saw and heard. They did that, and others were amazed.

There we have the first spiritual Christmas. Outcast shepherds sitting in some field near Bethlehem became the first men to hear and tell the Christmas story. Thats pretty amazing. Writes commentator Adam Clarke, These simple men, having satisfactory evidence of the truth of the good tidings, and feeling a divine influence upon their own minds, returned to the care of their flocks, glorifying God for what He had shown them, and for the blessedness which they felt What subjects for contemplation! What matter for praise!

The great challenge for us, then, is that we should all have a spiritual Christmas. We should all exalt and worship the newborn King as did the shepherds. When we do this, we can cut through some of the frustration and hassle of a season that has grown increasingly secular and commercial. It is great fun, to be sure, to be able to celebrate Christmas. But it brings us blessings to be able to exalt and worship the One who is Christmas. The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.

Rev. Charles A. Layne

First Baptist Church

PO Box 515

179 W. Broadway

Bunker Hill, IN 46914

765-689-7987

[email protected]

http://www.bhfirstbaptist.com

-- To unsubscribe, send ANY message to: [email protected]