Angels
Rev. Jonathan Wilhoft

My favorite part of the Christmas story is about an angel appearing to shepherds, while they were at work, to announce the birth of the Christ child. That angel didn’t run to the religious people in a fancy building. The shining being didn’t announce it to Bethlehem TV or run to the Jerusalem post to offer a front-page story. The angel came to shepherds. In biblical times, shepherds were among the lowest of the low. Outcasts. There weren’t welcome in cities – they stayed out in the fields with their sheep. They were thought of a low lifes, not to be trusted. In fact, there were considered so shady they couldn’t even testify in a court of law.

The angel announced one of the most important events in world history to them. “Don’t be afraid! For behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the city of David a Savior has been born to you. He is Christ the Lord.

In the story, an entire choir of angels then sang to them. After finding the special child and offering him worship the best way they knew how, they were filled with joy.

Going all over the countryside, they told anyone who would listen about their supernatural encounter.

Like most of us, they needed to make a living, so they went back to work tending to their sheep, back to their old humdrum, day-to-day existence. They may or may not have been happy about their lot in life, but now they had something beyond happiness: They had joy. The joy that the God of creation cared about them, even when no one else seemed to. And we can have that same joy, as we encounter the divine right where we are.

-Pastor Lynette