If you were planning to launch a political campaign, a new business or a new product line, who would you put at the top of your invite list? Wouldn’t it make good sense to invite people with money or power or influence, or better yet, all three! And likewise, if you asked people in the first century who should be invited to the coming out party for the Messiah, I would bet the list would start with the high priests and religious scholars, along with other celebrities, powerbrokers and dignitaries.
But that’s not how things went down. Instead, it was a ragtag group of lowly shepherds who were invited. It made little sense, but they were the ones who received a personal invitation to a makeshift nursery that had been set up in a barn in Bethlehem. The PR department charged with getting the word out about the birth of the Messiah, flipped the script and started at the bottom of the list!
Shepherds weren’t popular or powerful or prosperous. They were considered social misfits, thieves and religious outcasts, unclean and unable to participate in temple worship. They spent their lives with sheep. A dangerous job at times, but mostly just boring and thankless.
In the fields outside Bethlehem, the shepherds sit around discussing what they just witnessed. The angel had told them who the baby was and how they could find him. The shepherds decide quickly. Luke tells us they left in haste. The angel does not tell the shepherds to go, but there is no way to meet the Savior without responding to God’s invitation to come.
One can only imagine the faces of those gathered in the stable when the shepherds show up. These weren’t A-listers. They rarely made any list at all. But on this night, they were honored guests.
As they come into the place where Jesus lay, they make known to all what they heard from the angel out in the field concerning this child, “This is the Savior, who is Christ the Lord.” Those who heard what the shepherds said, stood in amazement and wondered at what they heard, but Mary sat by the manger and just pondered it all. She knew who the baby was, and these lowly shepherds had arrived to confirm it.
The shepherds are some of my favorite characters in the Christmas story. They don’t say much. They don’t do much. But it sure was important to God that they be there for the birth of Jesus. And that says a lot.
When the angels told the shepherds their good news, they said it was “good news of great joy for all the people.” If the word “all” included the likes of shepherds, then it really was for ALL people!
The story of the shepherds reminds us of the reach of the gospel to all people. This group of people, who were unpopular in society and without a religious bone in their bodies, this is the group that God chose to invite.
Our job is to extend the invitation. People get to choose what they will do with it. The shepherds said “yes”, and their lives were changed. They left their tents and campfires to go see for themselves. And afterwards, when they returned to their flocks, there was a new bounce in their step. They were no longer just lowly shepherds. The outsiders were now insiders. They left praising and glorifying God!
No one is beyond the reach of God’s grace. The gospel reaches into the lives of all people with a message of hope and salvation. That’s the kind of God we serve. That’s the kind of news that’s worth receiving and sharing. It’s GOOD news of GREAT joy for ALL people!
I invite you to prayerfully consider who it is that God may be calling you to invite to the celebration of the birth of The Savior. People, ALL people, are longing and looking for something good. Let’s give it to them!
You can go HERE to register for the service you plan to attend. When you register, you can also indicate the number of guests you plan to bring and if you are needing childcare (birth-5yrs).