2nd Sunday of Advent
December 9, 2018
Psalm 86:9-11; Luke 2:8-20
(Or watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1pySWZyWGA )
(Or watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1pySWZyWGA )
There was a daily comic strip that ran from 1981 to 2007
called “Kudzu.” It was about the Rev. Will B. Dunn and the folks in his town. It
was a pretty southern comic strip; did it make it in the papers up here? There
was one strip that I remember quite well. The first panel showed the good
Reverend on his knees, praying, “God, send me a sign!” The second panel shows Rev. Dunn, still on
his knees, next to a large flashing neon sign with the word “sign” on it. God answered his prayer; God sent him a sign.
It may not necessarily have been a helpful sign or what Rev. Dunn was looking
for, but God did what he asked. God gave him a large, bright sign that you
couldn’t miss.
We don’t know if the shepherds were looking for a sign
that night in the fields outside Bethlehem or not. We do know that they got a
large, bright sign that couldn’t be missed. An angel stood before them and the
glory of the Lord shone around them. It must have been bright! I imagine the
shepherds squinting as their eyes adjust from the dark of the night to the
brightness of the Lord’s glory. One minute it’s business as usual, and the next
minute, bam! Big, bright, flashing neon sign from God. While Rev. Dunn’s sign
simply said, “sign,” this sign says much more as the angel has instructions for
the shepherds.
This
is the third time in Luke that an angel has appeared. The angel Gabriel comes
to Zechariah to tell him he and his wife are about to have a son in their old
age, the son who will become known as John the Baptist. Then the angel Gabriel
goes to Mary, to tell her she’s also going to have a baby boy whom she’s to
name Jesus. Luke says Zechariah is “startled and gripped with fear,”[1]
and Mary is troubled and perplexed.[2]
What’s different with the shepherds was that this time it’s not just an angel
appearing; it’s an angel plus the glory
of the Lord shining all around them. The shepherds aren’t just startled or
perplexed, they are terrified. Their
response is sheer terror.
In all three cases, the first thing the angel has to
address is fear. Zechariah, Mary, and the shepherds are all told, “Do not be
afraid.” It’s one of the more common phrases in the Bible. God’s people are
told this over and over. Fear not. Don’t be scared. It’s like reassuring
children after bad dreams. The appearance of the angel and the sudden
brightness of the Lord’s glory has the shepherds scared to pieces. It isn’t just
unexpected. It isn’t just startling. It isn’t just perplexing. The shepherds
are the hired hands, working the night shift, guarding someone else’s sheep, in
someone else’s fields. They don’t want anything to go wrong. They don’t want
any trouble. They don’t want anything out of the ordinary. But God has other plans for them. God wants these lowly hired hands
to be the first ones to hear the good news of the birth of their savior. Yet to
get them to listen, to get them to pay attention, the angel has to address
their fear first.
Did you know that when you are frightened, the
intelligent parts of your brain stop working?[3]
In other words, when you’re scared, you’re dumber. Your logical thought process
is replaced by overwhelming emotions, and rather than taking the time to think
things through, you either react quickly, the fight-or-flight instinct, or you
freeze, like a deer in the headlights. You stick with short-term solutions and
don’t even think about long-term repercussions. We are not at our best when
we’re frightened. We don’t think logically when we’re overwhelmed, and we enjoy
life a lot less. We stop seeing the good that is all around us.
The angel’s first task is to get the shepherds ready to
listen. Calm down. It’s okay. You’re safe. You aren’t alone. The sheep are
safe. I’m not here to steal them. Take some deep breaths. Get your heart rate
back down, come down off the ceiling, or out from behind a rock. You don’t need
to be overwhelmed. You don’t need to be terrified. I’ve got BIG NEWS. I’ve got
GOOD NEWS. Are you ready to hear it? This is wonderful news for all people. Your savior is born today
in David’s city. He is Christ the Lord. The Messiah. Your savior. This will be
a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.
The first sign leads to another sign, neither of which the shepherds were
looking for in the first place!
How often do we look for signs when we’re not sure what
to do? God, if the phone rings, then I’ll do this. God, if I don’t make it to
the next round in this computer game, then I’ll do that. In Psalm 86, the
psalmist prays, “Teach me your way, Lord, that I may rely on your faithfulness;
give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name.” God’s way is not always
obvious and so it requires teaching in order to know it. God’s way is not obvious
to the shepherds, they need telling what to do next and how to know if they get
it right. And this isn’t a “teach me because I’m curious,” but a “teach me so
that I may actually live it out and do it and follow it.” Our hearts are often divided and thus we’re unable
to walk in God’s way. The fear that’s holding our brain hostage has to go. The
overwhelming emotions have to subside. They have to go so that we can hear
God’s voice, and not the voice of fear. They have to go so that we can live the
life God is calling us to live, a life of peace and love and hope and
gentleness. There is already enough hate out there; we don’t need to contribute
to it. We can be people of peace. We can be people of joy.
What good news am I missing? What don’t I see all around
me that’s worthy of joy, because I’m distracted, or fearful, or jumpy? When I
calm down my overwhelming feelings, when I let the intelligent, logical part of
my brain take control again, what do I see and hear? What’s the good news?
What’s right in front of me that will make me smile, if only I notice it?
After the angel relieves the shepherds’ fears and gives
them the good news and the next sign, a whole host of angels appears and praise
God saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth, peace and goodwill
among people.” This apparently does not freak out the shepherds; by now they’ve
learned to go with the flow and they know God is up to something. So once all
the angels leave, the shepherds decide to go to Bethlehem and see if it’s true.
Now, a couple things are interesting. One is that they leave the flock. Those
sheep they were in charge of, who didn’t belong to them, who was their job to
keep safe through the night? They leave ’em. They’re not worried about the
sheep anymore. And the shepherds don’t leisurely make their way over to
Bethlehem; no, they hurry. They have
been told great news, if it’s true, and they want to go find out now. There’s a sense of urgency to see
if their savior really has been born, if there really is a cause for great joy
for all people. Wouldn’t you want to know? Is this really true? Is my savior
really here? And they discover the answer
is yes. Exactly what the angel told them is exactly what they find.
Nowadays grades and news are posted online and you can
find out in the isolation of your own room. Back in the day they used to post
those things on community bulletin boards – here’s who got the top grades,
here’s who got the internships, here’s who won the scholarship – and everyone
crowded around to read the names, those whose names might be on the list more
excited and nervous than the rest. The shepherds aren’t each apart in their
rooms on their own computers finding out the answer is yes, they’re there in a
place with other people around them. And so when they shout out “Yes!” or “It
is true!” or “There really is a baby here!” or “The angel was right!” or “This
is the sign!”, others overhear them and Luke says that all who hear the
shepherds are amazed at what they say. There’s
been an angel sighting. More than that, there are shepherds who witnessed the
glory of the Lord, the dazzling brilliance of God’s presence and power. The
angel gave a sign and it came true exactly as promised. It is amazing.
And the shepherds return to their flocks. They go back to
where they started; only they are not the same. They are now glorifying and
praising God for all they have heard and seen. Life goes back to normal, kinda.
They’re still working the night shift, still caring for someone else’s sheep in
someone else’s field. But now they know their
Savior has been born. Now they know
the “good news of great joy.” They have heard it, they have seen it, they have
lived it. God came to them, out alone in the fields during the graveyard shift.
They were terrified. But now they are joyous. They are not alone. They are not
forgotten. God didn’t go tell the bigwigs first. God didn’t shine his glory on
the landowners. God’s glory shone on these shepherds. And once they were
willing to overcome their fear, once you scraped them from off the ceiling of
their terror, once they heard the angel’s message and followed the sign, they
were never the same.
The shepherds weren’t out looking for a sign that night,
but they sure got one. If you ask God for a sign, you may get one, although it
may or may not be as helpful as you’d like, as Rev. Dunn discovered. If God
sends you a sign that you weren’t expecting, however, it might just change the
world. Keep your eyes open this Advent season. Pay attention to the beauty and
joy all around you. Drive around and look at Christmas lights. If you’re not
one that needs to find joy right now, help others find it. Be the joy others
need to hear and see and feel.
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