Day 21 - Luke 2:12-14
20 Dec 2023
You can listen to an audio version of this blog post here -
“And this will 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!”
If I was to tell you to go somewhere and find something or someone you were looking for, the sign I’d give you to look out for would probably be something unusual. There would be no point in telling you to look out for something ordinary - you would be likely to miss what you were after.
If you visited London at the time of the coronation earlier this year but didn’t know exactly where to go, you would be looking out for the sign of the king. You would head towards the crowds and the sounds of the pageantry.
As the angel continues to speak to the shepherds, once again our familiarity with what he says can mean we ignore how surprising it is. He gives them a sign that God has come to earth, that he is here as saviour and king. But the nature of that sign is exactly the opposite to what we might expect.
If God has entered our world we might expect thunder, fire or a trumpet blast. Instead the sign given to the shepherds is simply that they will find “a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.” Remember what we noticed earlier on this chapter. This was probably not that unusual. So the sign the shepherds are to look out for feels like a huge anticlimax considering the message the angel has just brought.
However, this is exactly the point. The sign God has come, the sign that this is good news for all people is that he has come in humility. Fully man as well as fully God. Being born as a baby. Like us in every way (except for our sin). In this way, God is glorified. This is only way that we can have peace with God. The shepherds are to go and to be witnesses of this fact.
They are not to look out for any other sign or miracle other than this. But they are to listen and believe the message the angel brings. All the miracles they need to believe (the glory of the Lord surrounding the angel) are supporting the message they hear.
Of all the people in these chapters, the shepherds most represent us. We are to hear the message from the Lord and go to Jesus. This message is given to us with all the authority of God himself. The miracles (signs) he brought to accompany his word are still the signs which authenticate his word. The whole of Scripture leads up to the earth shattering event of Jesus being born.
And yet when we go to him we must not expect anything other than what the Lord himself tells us to find. Other religions and teachers may offer miracles and visions but we meet Jesus himself as we come to him in prayer and through his word. Other people may be surprised we worship one who was a baby, and then grew up to die on a cross. But he is Saviour and Lord - and one day he will come again in glory.