Holidays - Seasons Greetings!

Slowly, the angels floated across the sky and disappeared. The shepherds approached each other in the darkness and asked: “What did you see?” “Did you hear as I heard?” “Is it true that the Son of God has come to save the twelve tribes of Israel?” “You are sure that this is not the work of some evil Egyptian magician who would steal our flocks?” They babbled awhile, and one said: “Let us go over to Bethlehem and find out the truth about this thing the Lord has made known to us.”

Always, in times of crisis, the shepherds delegated a few of their number to guard the sheep. This time, in high excitement, they left in a group, confident that, in this moment of ecstasy, God would not permit their sheep to stray. They moved across the dark, grassy valley and up the sides of the hills, climbing and talking and wondering.

The older shepherds were certain that this was not a hoax. All Jews were good scriptural students and, because there were no common books, they memorized all their teachings about God. He had promised a savior, and the great one would come of the House of David. This would be Bethlehem. The aspect which mystified all the shepherds was that the birth of the messiah was undignified.

One could not imagine the Son of God being born in a stable.

It had been said by the elders that when the savior carne to earth, he could be expected on a great white cloud, sitting in august kingliness, listening to the trumpets and songs of hosts of angels surrounding his throne as he ruled over heaven and earth. Tonight, the angels seemed to be an afterthought. It was as though his birth had been so insignificant, so humble, that the angels had to come down to summon a few lonely men to go to the stable and worship him.

A stable? God? Could he not at least have been born in the great palace of Herod the King? Or perhaps in the Holy of Holies of the great temple of Solomon? A manger, the angel said. They understood the word. It meant a sort of trough out of which animals ate grain. It would have the sweet odor of old oats and barley, and the sides would be chewed and chipped. A salt cake would lie in the bottom.

The shepherds reached the top of the eminence and walked among the dozing pilgrims of Bethlehem, asking where the messiah might be found. Most of the men turned away from them in silence. A few asked what messiah; the shepherds asked if anyone had seen the angels. What angels? Some of the wayfarers were rude: they asked the shepherds if they had become mad through too much grape.

Abuse was not unbearable or new to the herders. They had known it before. Patiently, they continued their rounds, asking here and there and finally confining their questions to this: Where can we find a newborn baby in this town? Someone told them to try the inn. The innkeeper, exhausted with his labors, remembered the young man and pregnant young lady going to the cave beneath the inn.

The shepherds approached timidly. They moved down the path in their sandals, whispering. As they approached the lighted aperture, they crouched and coughed. Joseph came out. He studied them solemnly, without rancor, and the leaders told him that they had seen angels in the valley, and one angel had said that a messiah had been born this night in the town of David. They had-well, if it wasn’t too soon-they had come to worship him.

Mary heard, and told Joseph to permit the men to come in. Joseph had some tools in his hand. His spouse told him that the nights would be too cold to permit the infant to travel until after the circumcision. They would have to continue to live in the stable for eight days. Joseph had gone into town and awakened a carpenter and explained the circumstances. Now he had tools and, with the permission of the owner of the inn, he was using sides of stalls to build a small, almost private room for his Mary and baby.

The shepherds came in, the cowls down off their heads.

Their hair was long and ringleted, the beards trembled with murmured prayer, and the hands were clasped piously before their chests. In the flickering yellow light of the oil lamp, they saw the child-mother, seated on straw. She was looking over the side of an old manger. The men lifted themselves a little on their toes to peer over the sides. Inside was an abundance of white swaddling clothes. An aura of light seemed to radiate from it.

Without looking up, the mother knew that they were trying to see her precious baby, so she stuck a finger into the white cloth and pulled it away from the infant’s face. The men looked, with mouths open, and fell to their knees. They adored the baby, and thanked him for coming to save the nation. They recited some of the formal prayers. Joseph, standing aside, was amazed that so many strangers now knew the secret.

The shepherds were tom between wonderment and happiness. This little baby was God and the Son of God, but he was also a helpless, lovable infant. Their hearts welled with joy and the stem; deeply bronzed faces kept melting into big grins, which were quickly erased as the sheep men recalled that they were in the presence of the King of All Kings.

The scene in a chilly manger warmed by the bodies and breathing of the animals, was, to the shepherds, closer to their hearts than if the messiah had come on a big cloud with trumpeting angels. They understood babies, and they understood animals and they murmured with delight that God would see fit to come to earth in an abode only slightly less worthy than their own homes in the hills.

They remained kneeling, clasping and unclasping their hands, and staring at the face of the infant, as though trying to etch on their memories the peaceful scene, the tiny ruddy face, the serenity of the mother, who, by the grace of God, had her baby without pain. They were men of such poverty and humility that their colored thread-bare cloaks spoke more eloquently than their tongues. Their adoration came from full hearts.

If there was any wonderment in Mary’s heart, she did not show it. After a while, the shepherds stood and, in the manner of the Jews, apologized for intruding. They addressed their remarks to Joseph because to speak to Mary would have been immodest. They asked Joseph if he had seen the angels and he said no. They related all that had happened to them in the valley. Joseph shook his head. Mary nodded toward the sleeping baby, as though she and he alone understood that this was only the first of many great world events.

The shepherds left, praising God, and in their joy awakening people to tell them that the promised messiah had come. Everything, they said, had been revealed exactly as the angel in the sky had said it would be. Most of their audience ordered them to go in peace. Thus, if one can say that the place of birth was small, humble, a place of animals and odors, then one can also say that the first apostles were the most humble and scorned of men.