I wonder what I would have heard and seen had I been there that night in Bethlehem. Would I have heard the choirs of angels singing? Would I
have seen the star in the sky that night? Would I have understood the angel's message of Emmanuel, God with us, or would the cosmic implications of that evening have passed me by?
Certainly, very few people in Beth lehem saw and heard and understood what took place that night. The choirs of angels singing were drowned out by the haggling and trading going on in the Jerusalem bazaar. There was a bright star in the sky but the only ones apparently to pay any attention to it were pagan astrologers from the East.
If anyone did see Mary and Joseph on that night, they were too preoccupied with their own problems to offer any assistance.
You might say that had you been there at Bethlehem that night you would have seen and heard. You would have understood. Would you? There is one way of knowing. Ask yourself what you are seeing this Christmas season. When you watch the 6:00 news, do you see chaos and strife, or do you see sheep without a Shepherd?
When you go out to do your shopping, do you see only hordes of people in the stores or do you notice the worried expressions on some of their faces?
Worried because they are facing this Christmas without employment and they don’t know how they are going to make ends meet.
Ask yourself what you are hearing this Christmas. Do you hear only the blasts of music and carols, or do you hear the silent sighs of the lonely and the bereaved who may be dreading Christmas because it accentuates their loneliness?
You see, so often what we see and what we hear is not dependent upon the event but upon ourselves. If you do in fact hear the cry from the lonely, the laughter of poor children, if you see the sheep without a shepherd, then you might just have seen the events that took place in Bethlehem that night.
“In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flocks by night. Then an angel
of the Lord stood before them, and
the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified." (Luke 2:8-9 NIV) It was the shepherds who first heard the message about Jesus’ birth. Why the shepherds? Because God is to be found in the places of dire human need.
God comes to us through people with all their handicaps, ordinariness, and disabilities….especially the disability of poverty.
This Christmas season Jesus stands among us, although disguised. If you turn away the addict, the beggar, the elderly, the lonely, the refugee, or the powerless, you may be turning away Jesus.
I think the challenge for us this season is to see the shepherds in our midst. We have plenty of shepherds in the world today. Unfortunately, as a society, we have become blind to them. We walk past them and pretend
we don't even see them.
In our pride we overlook them. In our comfort we ignore them. But these are the folks to whom the message of the birth of Jesus Christ, the Savior, came first.
Celebrate the birth of Christ by doing something for the shepherds of this world. Amen.
(Rev. Judy Carlson, United Methodist Church)
