It’s Christmas Eve, perhaps my second favorite day of the year with tomorrow being number one. Today is pregnant with hope, trembling with anticipation for the fulfillment of his Word, the arrival of Messiah. Today is a day of wonder; to contemplate why God planned our redemption this way—why He planned it at all. Was He, too, quivering with expectancy, waiting for Mary’s contractions to begin? Although He was seeing His plan unfold from outside of time, I picture him bending over His time-driven world, scrutinizing all things as Mary’s time grew near. He knew the stable was waiting; I wonder if He’d had the shepherds clean it out and fill it with fresh hay, oblivious that they were readying it for Messiah’s birth. Mary and Joseph spent their last childless night together. Tomorrow, they’d be parents.
Eagerly God watched as morning dawned. This was the day! Mary’s contractions may have begun that morning and Joseph hurried to find a safe and clean place for her to deliver. We know the familiar story. No rooms were available, but they were offered accommodations among the animals. It was private, safe, and clean enough. Imagine God guiding his Son through the birth canal and watching Him come forth. Can you picture God, the ecstatic father, leaping for joy at Jesus’s first cry! All of heaven must have shaken at His shout! He had risked it all. His Son now lived in a body. God became flesh. The Father knew what was in store for Jesus—sorrow upon sorrow, excruciating pain at the end of his life as Jesus allowed Himself to be slaughtered as the perfect sacrificial lamb to cover the sins of all mankind for all time. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit had made their plan together; they were in perfect agreement. It was daring; brilliant, yet simple enough to confound the powers of darkness. And now, the time had come. The Messiah, who would save His people, prophesied by holy men for thousands of years, longed for by all of Israel, the hope of all people, had finally come.
God sent an angel to announce the news to the shepherds. “Fear not, for behold I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger,” Luke 2:10-12.
Why did God pick the shepherds for this epic announcement? The shepherds of Bethlehem raised sheep, bringing their perfect, unblemished lambs to the temple in Jerusalem on a regular basis for the priests to use in their daily sacrifices. Under the Old Covenant, the blood of these spotless lambs covered the sins of the people. But not for long. They had to be offered day after day. Hebrews 10:11-14 says, “Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again, and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But when this priest [Jesus] had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, and since that time he waits for his enemies to be made his footstool. For by one sacrifice, he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.”
God knew what was coming for His Son. But He celebrated His birth in a big way! On Christmas night, there was a birthday party in heaven with so much joy God decided to let the shepherds see some of it! After the angel’s startling proclamation to them, the ecstatic Father, the conductor of the universal orchestra, pointed his baton at the rejoicing angels, and thousands of them burst through the barrier between heaven and earth in full volume and stunning brilliance. “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!’” Luke 2:13-14. What a night! What a glorious night—the night our Savior was born!
Dwayne and I pray that the wonder of Christ’s birth will fill you with joy this Christmas; that regardless of your circumstances, you will put your thoughts on Him and join with the angels and with the church around the world in giving Him praise. For He has bought us with His blood and allowed us to be born, again, into His family. “But to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God.” John 1:12. Merry Christmas to all of you, dear friends.