Tag: Adoration of the Shepherds

Advent Sings: Wondering

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The Adoration Of The Shepherds. Giovanni Andrea De Ferrari
The Adoration Of The Shepherds. Giovanni Andrea De Ferrari

When the angels went away from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.” And they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in a manger. And when they saw it, they made known the saying that had been told them concerning this child.  And all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds told them.
Luke 2: 15-18

There is no specific “song of the shepherds” recorded in scripture.  They were unlikely people to be inspired to use flowery words and memorable turns of phrase.   Scripture says simply they looked at each other and agreed to get to Bethlehem as fast as possible and see for themselves what they had been told by God.   There was no time to waste singing out praises and thanksgiving;  they “went with haste.”

Witnessing an appearance of the heavenly host followed by seeing for themselves the incarnation of the living God in a manger must have been overwhelming to those who otherwise spent much time alone and in silence.  They must have been simply bubbling over with everything they had heard and been shown.  At least scripture does tell us the effect the shepherds’ witnessing words had on others: “and all who heard it wondered…”

I don’t think people wondered if the shepherds were embroidering the story, or had a group hallucination, or were flat out fabricating for reasons of their own.  I suspect Mary and Joseph and the townspeople who heard what the shepherds had to say were flabbergasted at the passion and excitement being shared about what had just taken place.  Seeing became believing and all could see how completely the shepherds believed by how enthusiastically they shared everything they knew.

We know what the shepherds had to say, minimalist conversationalists that they are.   So we too should respond with wonder at what they have told us all.

And believe as they do.

An Advent Tapestry–Fear Not

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Adoration of the Shepherds by Charles Lebrun, 1689

Click on this painting for the link to a larger version–it is well worth it!

“How often we look upon God as our last and feeblest resource! We go to Him because we have nowhere else to go. And then we learn that the storms of life have driven us, not upon the rocks, but into the desired haven.”  George MacDonald

Fear often becomes the thing we fear the most. And it need not be. Being afraid in the face of the unexpected happened years and years ago to people who were society’s cast-offs, relegated to tending flocks as they had no other skill of value. They were the forgotten and the least of men. Yet what they saw and heard that Christmas night put them, of all people, first in line to see God in flesh,  allowing them access no one else had.

Within the routine familiarity of their fields and flocks came this most unexpected experience, terrifying in its sheer “other worldliness”, and blinding in its grandeur. They were flattened with fear and dread, “sore” afraid, hurting all over in their terror.

And so the reassurance came: “Be not afraid”.  It is reiterated over and over:  “Fear not!”

The shepherds picked themselves up, dusted themselves off and obediently went on their way to the safety and familiar security of a barn, to see with their own eyes what they could not imagine: a baby born in so primitive a place, yet celebrated from the heavens. The least becomes first, and the first becomes the least.

Sometimes, in these dark times, our terror is for good reason, and we feel driven upon the rocks of life.  But we need to understand where we truly land in those terrifying moments.  It is the safe haven of God’s arms,  as He gazes up at us from a manger bed, walks with us through the valley of our fear, and gathers us in to safe haven when we were sure there was nowhere else to go.

 

Annunciation_to_the_Shepherds_Abraham_Hondius_1663

click on painting for link to larger version

An Advent Tapestry–Repugnant Grace

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Adoration of the Shepherds by Anton Raphael Mengs

Nothing is more repugnant to capable, reasonable people than grace… John Wesley

I love this particular painting of the Nativity by Bohemian artist Anton Raphael Mengs because everyone–Mary, shepherds, angels, even Joseph with his wondering look of awe at the hubbub this birth has created– looks completely amazed and almost besotted with the new Christ child.  There is an attraction, almost magnetic, toward this gift from God.

Every day capable, reasonable people turn away from this gift, unable to trust that it was truly meant for them, as undeserving as they (we) are.

How can we accept this incredible gift and not respond?  How can we shrug our shoulders and not be truly amazed?

Yet it happened.   A gift beyond our ability to imagine or understand.    The fact we can’t understand should not make the gift of grace repugnant.   We simply, like Joseph, must sit in awe and wonder.

An Advent Tapestry–Lies in Manger Pressed as Hay

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Adoration of the Shepherds by Gerard van Honthorst
Man altered by sin from man to beast;
Beast’s food is hay, hay is all mortal flesh.
Now God is flesh and lies in manger pressed
As hay, the brutish sinner to refresh.
O happy field wherein this fodder grew,
Whose taste doth us from beasts to men renew.
from The Nativity of the Christ  by Robert Southwell, Jesuit poet (1561-1595)
I spent considerable time up in our hay loft today, pulling bales down off the stack, throwing them down to pile up for feed for the horses over the next several days.  This poem by a priest from the 16th century kept resonating in my mind as I remembered the green fields that yielded this hay, gathered by our family and friends on a hot summer’s evening, and placed in the barn so I could do just what I did today.
I have written about hay before, but appreciate Southwell’s concept of God now flesh,  as the hay which forms His bed, refreshes and renews the sinner to righteousness:
Hay crew
Remembered on
Frosty mornings before dawn
When bales are broken for feed
And fragrant summer spills forth.

In the dead of winter
During the darkest blowing icy nights
The bales open like a picture book
Illustrating how life once was,
and will be again~

Rainy spring nights hay
Becomes soft bedding
For new foals’ sleep 

To guarantee sunshine
In the barn
On the darkest of days:
Communion.