Nobody is nobody

I find it fascinating that this fact is immortalized in the words of scripture: We all know that the first public proclamation of the Birth of Christ was to SHEPHERDS.(if you love the Peanuts’ Christmas cartoon as much as I do you know this by heart ;-)

 And in that region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear.

 I’ve never had an angelic apparition, but this seems about right. This fear is the normal reaction… And the Angel says what angels always say:

 “Be not afraid; for behold, I bring you good news of great joy which will come to all the people;  for to 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 clothes and lying in a manger.” And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and singing, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to people of good will.”

Which we echo every Sunday in the Gloria, right? It's important to remember the Scriptural sources of those prayers we pray ;-)This is such an amazing scene that it can be difficult to imagine – a host of heavenly beings singing appears in the middle of nowhere to a bunch of nobodies. The shepherds are nobody. And nobody really likes them. They don’t trust them. Religious Jews looked down on this kind of work.But God often chooses shepherds in the Old Testament – Abel, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, David…Because nobody is a nobody.He also chooses people from “nowhere” like Nazareth (can anything good come from Nazareth?). Because nowhere is nowhere for God.We are all precious in God’s eyes. Precious enough to encounter heavenly messengers and be entrusted with this important message and then to ACT.The innkeepers of Bethlehem also had this opportunity, right? Joseph and Mary knocked on their doors, but they were too busy for this encounter. In a world of inn keepers who fail to be receptive, we need to give ourselves permission to be  shepherds. In a world that insists that things are the way they are, that things need to be a certain way, that is quick to judge unfairly, and that fails in creativity so it is unable to find a way to help people who need help, the shepherds are independent of all that the world deems important. And they encounter the word of God (thru angels) and receive it.Now it seems like it’s worth asking: What allows and prepares for their receptivity?I am going to suggest that it is their very difficulty, their neediness, their helplessness.The very things that we see as negative and try to eliminate from our lives are the very things that open up in us the kind of space we need to hear and accept and obey the message of God - to ENCOUNTER, RECEIVE INTO US, and ACT ON the message of God.In a world that believes that difficulties are valueless and should be eliminated, we need to give ourselves permission  to embrace the difficulties of the day with generosity, knowing they open up in us receptivity to the will of God that would not otherwise be possible.So God has come to earth. God now calls these shepherds through the angels.What is next? They must ACT on this word.This is what the shepherds did. Luke tells us:

When the angels went away from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, "Let us go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened which the Lord has made known to us.”And they went in haste, and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in a manger.

They GO, quickly. They SEE. They encounter the living God.In a kind of parallel, later in the Gospel we learn that Jesus’ first words to His apostles are:“COME and SEE.” Remember when John Baptist points to the Lamb of God, and several followers go to Him and ask, "Rabbi, what’s up?" He answers, "Come and see." Because we can only know Him by BEING WITH Him.His final words to them before His Ascension will be, “GO and make disciples, baptizing… and TEACHING them all I have commanded.”First we come, then we go. First we spend time with Jesus, then we are sent to share the Good News. The shepherds do this instinctively; Luke says:

 And when they saw it they made known the saying which had been told them concerning this child; and all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds told them. And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.

The shepherds, then, are the first “Christ-bearers” after Mary! They bring this Good News to others because they are filled with joy and wonder which causes them to praise and glorify God, and then their witness stirs wonder in others.Because that’s what happens when something wonderful happens. When something awesome happens, we don't say, "THAT WAS SO AWESOME!! I am not going to tell anyone about this.” On the contrary, we are impelled to share it with others! I'm afraid that sometimes, we fail to see that the Good News is good enough to share because we haven’t yet been moved by wonder and awe. But this is part of the perennial “magic” of Christmas, isn’t it? Wonder and awe.We are all children in December, or we should be. Let's allow ourselves, like Mary, to be moved by wonder and awe this Christmas.