The Scripture reading for our sermon this morning is from Luke chapter 2. Luke chapter 2 beginning at verse 1 and reading down through verse 21. Luke chapter 2, this is God's own Word. In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria, and all went to be registered, each to his own town. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child. And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth, and she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn. And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. 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. And the angel said to them, Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior who is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign for you. You will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel, a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom He is pleased. When the angels went away from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us. And they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph and the baby lying in a manger. And when they saw it, they made known the saying that had been told them concerning this child. And all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds told them. But Mary treasured up all these things, pondering them in her heart. And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen as it had been told them. And at the end of eight days, when he was circumcised, he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb. So far, the reading of God's Word. The New Testament tells us quite a bit about the events which surrounded the birth of Jesus. It also tells us quite a bit about the meaning of that birth for us. But when you look closely at the New Testament, it's perhaps a bit of a surprise how little the New Testament tells us about that first Christmas day. In fact, it's only in Luke's gospel that we have any description of what happened on Christmas day. Matthew doesn't tell us. Mark doesn't tell us. John doesn't tell us. Paul doesn't tell us in his epistles. It's only in Luke, that Christmas Day specifically is focused on, and we're told something of what happened on that day. Initially, that day was a fairly ordinary day. There were some unusual features. There was a young family that were traveling away from home and could find shelter only in some kind of barn or cave. It was a family that had a baby that day, and yet there were no Christmas lights highlighting that barn. There were no tourists coming to town. It was an ordinary day with ordinary people in most ways. And on that day, Luke tells us, there was only one thing that was truly extraordinary that happened, only one miracle that occurred. And that was a miracle not in the town of Bethlehem, but out in the fields outside, a miracle that came at night to shepherds. And shepherds in that society were kind of the lowest of the low. There was nothing romantic about being a shepherd. It meant being away from home. It meant being out with dumb sheep. It meant being at night in the dark, lonely, perhaps, depending on the time of year, cold. And so, these shepherds were out in the fields at night watching their sheep. We don't know exactly how many there were, probably not a lot, two, three, four, something like that. They were settling in for a night of loneliness, of cold, And suddenly, there was a miracle. Suddenly, on this day, which in so many ways was an ordinary day, to these very ordinary people came this miracle, and we're told that the angel of the Lord appeared to them. We have no description of what that actually meant. I bet you got a number of Christmas cards with an angel kind of floating in the air. Most likely, this angel appeared right on the ground next to the shepherds. That's what angels tended to do, as we find them described when they appear in the New Testament. When the angel Gabriel appeared to Zechariah in the temple, prophesying the birth of John the Baptist, we're told the angel stood right next to him. We have no description of what this angel looks like, although most of the time angels in the New Testament look like human beings, probably no wings. Angels, you know, in and of themselves are spirit beings. They don't have bodies. And so, when they appear to human beings, they take on a form so they can be seen, but it's not the form of who they really are. And most of the time in the New Testament, they're described as looking rather human. And so, this angel appears, and yet it's immediately obvious that this is something special that's happening. It's not just a man who has wandered in from the dark, and part of the specialness of this moment comes from the fact we're told that glory, the glory of the Lord, shines around them all. So, suddenly from functioning in this dark night, maybe a little campfire burning, giving all the light they had, suddenly the glory of the Lord is shining around about them, we're told. This word for shining is only used one other place in the New Testament, in Acts 26, where Paul is talking about his conversion experience on the road to Damascus. And in that experience, he said, suddenly at midday, light shone on me brighter than the sun itself. And since Luke wrote that, we can kind of assume that the same kind of shining is here, a light brighter than the sun at midday. Think how it must have shocked those shepherds from this lonely, quiet, dark moment to suddenly an angel, an angel of the Lord appearing, and the glory of the Lord, the brightness of the Lord, the shining light of the Lord surrounding them on every side. What an amazing thing. And so, we want to look at what the shepherds are teaching us first by what they see, and then by what they hear, and then by what they say to one another and to us. The shepherds are teaching us still the only real teaching we have from that first Christmas day in the Scriptures, what they see, what they hear, and what they say. What do they see? They see this angel, and then they see this light, and then they see suddenly, we're told, as if this all hasn't been sudden. Unexpectedly, maybe shockingly, they see a multitude, we're told, of the heavenly host. Think of that. We're so used to this language, we may not pause to really reflect on it. A multitude, many, many. We don't know exactly how many, but it's a lot, suddenly a lot of angels. And how are they described? They're described as a host, an army. That's how we really ought to translate it. We're, again, I think inclined to think from our Christmas cards that this was a beautiful choir floating in the air. But it doesn't tell us where this host was. It only tells us that it was in the first place an army. And what would the sudden appearance of an army say? It would say something powerful is happening, something strong is happening. Many of our hymns talk about how these angels sweetly sing. Well, actually, the Scripture doesn't say they sing at all. Maybe they did, but we have to beware of reading our Christmas cards into the text. It doesn't say they sang, and it doesn't say where they stood. Again, these angels we usually think of as floating in midair, and maybe they were in midair. I think we think that because it says they're the heavenly host. But they're God's heavenly army, primarily when they don't appear. So, perhaps they're an army right on earth, standing around these shepherds, standing around that central, revealing angel. Think how that would have affected the shepherds. Suddenly, this host, this army, presumably not holding lutes, but holding swords, they're testifying that the Lord is doing something strong, something powerful. That's the miracle of Christmas Day. Something powerful is happening in the weakness of this little baby that's born. That's what the shepherd saw. That's what amazed them. That's what the text says filled them with great fear. How did you feel when you woke up this morning? Is that me? It's for emphasis. How did you feel when you woke up this morning? Did you feel joyful? you feel burdened? Got to get in the kitchen and start things going. Probably you didn't wake up and experience great fear. But that's what the Christmas miracle first brought to these angels, great fear. And the angel knew that would happen, and so Luke moves from what the shepherds saw to what the shepherds heard. What did they hear? The first words they heard were, fear not. Fear not. Life can be frightening. Events are surprising. I may take this off and just shout at you. but the angel says, fear not. The great joy, the great joy will displace the great fear. Should I take this off? What? Okay, keep going. The great joy will replace the great Peter because the angel comes with good news. That's what this says. I have good news for you. I have good news for you. That's the joy that should well up in our hearts, that God has come to us on Christmas Day with good news. And this is the good news. that a child has been born. A child has been born who will be your Savior. Now, the shepherds, we don't know how much they knew. We don't know how well catechized they were. We don't know how much of the Old Testament they had learned. Shepherds traditionally were not learned people. But even the least learned in Israel must have known that there was a promise that one day God would come to his people, that God would one day send a Messiah, his anointed one, that God would come to do a great work of deliverance for his people. And that's what the angel declares, God has come at last, late in time appearing, we sang, God has come at last to be a savior to his people in this child. This child, who is Christ, who is Messiah, who is the anointed one, who is the awaited one, this child, this Savior, who is Lord, that's the good news. That's the good news of Christmas Day. All the expectation is fulfilled. All the waiting has come to an end. God, who has prophesied for thousands of years that he would send a Savior, has fulfilled that promise on Christmas Day. The Savior has come. What could be better? And God says to these shepherds, these humble representatives of the people, God says to them, you can go and see it. You can go and see it, and you'll have a sign. You'll have a sign that you found the right baby when you find that baby lying in a manger. That is, when you find that baby lying in a feeding trough in a barn. That's not where you usually find babies, is it? It's not where you expect to find a baby. And these shepherds probably thought rather quickly to themselves, you know, Bethlehem is a small town. Bethlehem is a place we know. And we know there's probably only one or two places in Bethlehem where strangers might find shelter. And they probably thought to themselves, it won't be hard to find the barn where the feeding trough is, where there's a baby, if this is true. and so they go they go to look but before they go this army appears and this army declares glory to God in the highest and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased again the scripture says they say this and some places in the scripture where it says say this it's rather clear they sang it and maybe these angels sang it but I couldn't help but wonder if maybe they said it kind of in the spirit of marines hoorah is that maybe what this army said as they said glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to those with whom he is pleased. What an amazing thing to think of this multitude whether singing or shouting giving glory to God. That is magnifying his name. That is helping other people to know more about him. God's glory, of course, is never actually increased by what we do, but God's glory can be made known to people who haven't known it. And that's what this army is doing in singing, shouting to God. And they're making a promise. Because God is glorious, because God has given his Son, because God has given his Son to be a Savior, there'll be peace on earth for those with whom God is well pleased. What a wonderful thing to hear on Christmas Day. What a wonderful promise to receive on Christmas Day. And so these shepherds, these simple souls have had this privilege of seeing the glory of God and of hearing the gospel of God. And now the shepherds speak. They speak, first of all, to one another. And they say, let us go and see this thing that the Lord has made known to us. Do you see how they're going in faith? They have believed that what they saw is from the Lord. They believed that this angel had truly come with the gospel. They believed the explanation that the angel gave about who this baby they would find really is. I think probably in hospitals today they put name tags on babies, Maybe bracelets that identify who the baby is so it won't be confused. Mary didn't really need a name tag. There weren't other babies in the manger. But had the shepherds arrived without the message of the angels and just seen the baby in the manger, they wouldn't really have known who that was, would they? There was nothing special about Jesus in his appearance as he lay in the manger. He was just an ordinary baby. There was no halo. There were no angels there. We don't know for sure that there were other animals there. The three wise men from the east hadn't come yet. It was very ordinary. only by the word of the gospel did the shepherds know who this was, the word they had received from the angels. And really interestingly, Luke says, these shepherds told Mary and Joseph and the others who were standing around who this child was. The angels who came as messengers from God had turned these humble shepherds into messengers from God to speak the truth of God to Mary and to Joseph and to the onlookers. We don't know exactly how many people were there. Probably when Mary went into labor, Joseph sent for the wise women of the town to come and help with the birth. Those onlookers certainly didn't know what promises had surrounded the coming of this child. but the shepherds were preaching the gospel, preaching the gospel to Mary and to Joseph and to the onlookers. Mary and Joseph had had promises from angels, but now the shepherds come to say those promises are fulfilled. And we're told Mary treasured all of this in her heart. She pondered it. She thought about it. And tradition says that Mary, later in her life, told Luke about these events. And Luke wrote them down. And we have them because Luke wrote them down. We wouldn't know anything about these shepherds, would we, if Luke hadn't written it down. So God preached the gospel through the angels to the shepherds. The shepherds preached the gospel to Mary. Mary preached the gospel to Luke, and Luke preaches the gospel to us. What a wonderful thing that we have an opportunity to hear the very words of God explaining who Jesus is. And then in verse 20, we read, And the shepherds returned. I don't know how long it's safe to leave sheep out in a field by themselves. They had a job. They had gone to Bethlehem in haste to see what was happening. Now they hurry back. And on their way, they're speaking to God, we're told. They've spoken to one another. They've spoken to Mary and Joseph. Now they speak to God, glorifying him and praising him for what they had heard and seen. Clearly, this whole passage from Luke's hand is intended to lead us to praising and glorifying God for what we have seen and heard, what we have heard about that child who is born to be the Savior, the Christ, the Lord. This text says to us that some of those standing around wondered. They were amazed. They were surprised. Through all of Jesus' life, there will be people standing around, hearing what he says, seeing what he does, and being amazed, wondering. And the message of the gospel is many of those people saw and heard and wondered but didn't believe. And so the gospel comes to us today and says we all wondered about Jesus but the gospel calls us to believe him to believe that he is the gift of God to believe that he is the savior of his own that he is the Christ given by God that he is Lord Lord of all and so on this Christmas day let us enter in to the experience of the shepherds let us allow the shepherds to teach us and let us be people who believe who glorify God and praise him for such a great salvation in the gift of his own son Amen let us pray Oh, Lord, how we thank you for your unspeakable gift of your own Son to be with us, to care for us, to save us. Help us to see our need of salvation, that in ourselves we cannot come close to you in your holiness. But in Jesus, the faithful one, the holy one, we may come near. And because of Jesus, we may know you as Father and be filled with hope and joy in believing. May your Holy Spirit bring this Christmas message into the hearts of each one of us. And may we go out rejoicing and glorifying God. Hear us, we pray, in Jesus' name. Amen.