You've read and heard Luke's account of the birth of Jesus countless times, the Colonel is sure. The Roman emperor, Octavian -- or, as he called himself, Caesar Augustus -- wanted to know how many folks made up his empire, and commissioned a census. It was billed as a matter of determining the tax base, but the Colonel suspects, from what he knows about Octavian, that it was just as much a matter of Octavian's egotistical desire to know the extent of his dominion over humanity.
At any rate, Luke tells us that in order to be counted, citizens of the empire had to return to their cities of birth. So, this man named Joseph, whose wife Mary was expecting to give birth at any moment, took his new bride back to his ancestral home.
Bethlehem.
The city of David.
Bell and Gore hadn't invented the telephone and internet, yet, so Joseph had no way of making reservations for a place to stay in Bethlehem. When they arrived after traveling nearly 80 miles from Nazareth to Bethlehem, they found the tiny village so packed with folks who had, like Joseph, left the farm to work in the big city, that there was only room to sleep in a stable.
Now, English translations of the original Greek in which Luke's account was written use the phrase "because there was no room in the inn." From what the Colonel has studied about the size of Bethlehem two thousand years ago, he is apt to believe that there was no inn at all. It's possible that the home of Joseph's family in Bethlehem had no private room in which Mary could give birth.
Anyway, Mary gave birth to Jesus in a livestock shelter and used a feed trough for a cradle. Pretty humble for the King of the Universe.
The Colonel believes that we have these very intimate details of Jesus' birth because when Luke began writing his Gospel and the Book of Acts for his patron, Theophilus, he interviewed Mary. The events of Jesus' birth were so dramatic and wondrous that Luke tells us that "Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart." (Luke 2: 19)
As memorable as giving birth in a stable was for Mary, an even more memorable occurrence was the visit shortly thereafter from a bunch of shepherds, and the story they told her.
Can you imagine the incredulity of Joseph and Mary when these shepherds told them their story?
Luke tells us that the night of Jesus' birth, these shepherds were keeping watch over their flock in the fields outside of Bethlehem. (Luke 2:8)
Now, humor the Colonel and put yourself in the place of these shepherds.
It's dark.
Pre-Edison dark.
Dark enough that the brightest light you can see is the Milky Way splashed across the sky overhead.
It's so quiet that you can hear your hair grow.
You're sleepy, but your job is to stay alert and keep your flock safe from predators and thieves.
Your senses are heightened in the dark and quiet -- eyes dilated to take in as much ambient light as possible and ears attuned to the slightest rustle from the sleeping sheep, or the footfall of a predator.
Now just maybe you can understand the abject terror the shepherds felt at what happened next. Luke tells us -- and the Colonel believes that Mary told him what the shepherds told her -- that an angel of the Lord suddenly appeared to the shepherds and "...the glory of the Lord shone around them." (Luke 2:9)
Imagine going from hidden in pitch black dark to spotlighted by the brightest light you have ever seen. And, oh, by the way there's an angel in front of you.
Not a winged, chubby baby. Angels don't look like that.
The angel in front of you is a fierce, inhuman creature, unlike anything you have ever seen before.
That the shepherds didn't scream and scatter like a bunch of adolescent girls at a haunted house shows just how terrified they were.
Don't know about you, but as much as the Colonel's flight or fight reflex has a trained bias toward the latter, he's not sure he wouldn't have been leading the choir of adolescent screamers and scatterers.
The angel's reassurance to the shepherds is one of the most quoted of all passages in scripture:
"Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger." (Luke 2:10-12)
As if this angel's appearance and message wasn't traumatic enough, the shepherd's then saw "a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men." (Luke 2: 13-14)
Because the Colonel believes that Jesus was the incarnation of God's Son, and that God's Son is the Commander of the Army of the Lord, he believes this "multitude of the heavenly host" was the Army of the Lord.
The Colonel can't prove that, and far more learned men than he may scoff at the notion, but the Colonel likes to think that the Army of the Lord wouldn't have missed out on singing in this cantata.
But, why are a ragtag group of lowly shepherds the recipient of these "good tidings of great joy." Why the shepherds?
Why not the High Priest at the temple in Jerusalem?
Or, some other literate person or group of people. Why not make this angelic appearance and announcement on the steps of the temple at high noon on the day before the Sabbath, when all of Jerusalem would be in attendance?
Two reasons, the Colonel thinks.
First, he believes that the angel of the Lord and the multitude of heavenly hosts appeared to the shepherds at the very moment of Jesus' birth. And, the Colonel believes the shepherds were chosen to receive these good tidings for their symbolism throughout God's word. God didn't just pick the shepherds on a whim.
God does nothing on a whim.
God inspired David to write the Psalm to demonstrate the loving care God has for His people -- like a shepherd cares for his sheep.
Jesus' Himself used the shepherd analogy numerous times to teach regarding God's love and the purpose of Jesus' own ministry.
Secondly, but perhaps most importantly, the Colonel believes God picked the shepherds for what they were watching.
Just up the road a few miles from the fields outside Bethlehem, stood the temple in Jerusalem -- the only acceptable location to which all Jews were to bring their most important sacrifices. From the beginning of His relationship with man, God demanded a blood sacrifice to atone for sin of man.
Not just any sacrificial animal would do. It was supposed to be one without blemish. An animal of higher value than the rest.
And, in remembrance of the Passover lambs whose blood marked the doorposts of the Hebrews and excluded them from the plague of the death of the first born in Egypt; young, defenseless sheep were the traditional sacrifice brought to the temple in Jerusalem.
It's entirely possible that the shepherds outside of Bethlehem were watching over flocks from which came lambs for blood sacrifice.
The Colonel likes to believe so.
The Colonel believes that sacrificing a lamb only temporarily atoned for a man's sin. He believes this because a Jew didn't just sacrifice a lamb once -- he did it every year.
The Colonel believes that God sent His messenger angel to proclaim to shepherds watching over lambs, whose sacrifice was a temporary atonement, that the Lamb of God was come whose sacrifice would be final.
No comments:
Post a Comment