December 2009
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Once again, God has led us to this season of prayer and fasting so that we might prepare ourselves spiritually to celebrate the birth of His Son. With the sights, sounds, and scents of the Nativity season filling all our senses, we reflect upon that Holy Night in which the Son of God condescended to enter into our world and into human history in order to raise us to life with Him.
The night of the Lord’s birth was a night for shepherds and angels. Angels sang His praises in the heavens. Shepherds adored him on earth. It was an unusual, never-before experience. The shepherds were outcasts among the people. The angels were part of the highest level of God’s creatures. The bottom and the top of God’s created beings celebrated that night. Everyone else seems to have slept through it all.
Why were the angels so excited? God becoming human did nothing for them personally. They were not part of fallen creation. Of course, the angels who had remained faithful to God celebrated everything that God did. And the angels, on this holy night, were well aware that the birth of Jesus was a fulfillment of the promise that would open heaven to the human race. Perhaps the angels saw the birth of the Lord as an invitation to the human race to join in the heavenly banquet which they had never left. And so they joyously proclaimed the glad tidings, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men of good will” (Luke 2:14).
The angels sang and the shepherds adored. Why did the Lord reveal His birth to shepherds before the rest of mankind? Why weren’t the powerful of the world the first to hear the Good News of the Birth of the Savior? Why wasn’t it to the priests that these glad tidings were first proclaimed? Why weren’t those “Glories to God in the highest” first sung to the learned and wise of the world?
God announced the Birth of Christ to the shepherds through angelic choirs and the sound of the angels’ song moved the shepherds to believe and to act. They responded to the angels’ announcement by saying, “Let us go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has come to pass, which the Lord has made known to us!” (Luke 2:15). Let’s take a chance. Let’s set aside our usual routine. Let’s change our lives and go to Bethlehem and see if we can find this Newborn King of the Jews! And find Him they did. And then, as Luke reports, they
“…returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, as it was told them” (Luke 2:20).
We don’t know what happened to the shepherds after that. We don’t know if the Lord revealing Himself to the shepherds changed their lives or whether or not they dedicated themselves to the Lord’s service. But there is a chance that they did. On at least that one occasion they had shown the energy and get-up-and-go to go out of their way to see the Lord. Perhaps this was a beginning that would bring them to the Lord again and again throughout their lives. If so, no matter what happened to them in the interim, in the end they joined their angelic companions at the Lord’s eternal banquet.
We, like the shepherds, have received the Good News of Salvation. It has been announced to us time and time again throughout our lives. We know that the Lord has come to us. Acknowledging this, we must ask ourselves, how willing are we to set aside the routines of our lives to “go to Bethlehem,” and to seek out the Lord? How willing are we to make the effort to go to the Lord and to recognize that He is present among us.
As Orthodox Christians we have so many opportunities to draw nearer to the Lord. The Church offers us so many ways in which we can encounter the Lord. This Nativity fast and the Nativity season provide us with yet another opportunity to encounter the Lord Who is present among us— and Who is present with us not just at this time of the year, but every day of our lives. It’s my prayer that during the Nativity season all of us will respond to those angelic voices and join the shepherds in seeking out Christ, Emmanuel, God-With-Us, the Lord Who has come to save us. Let’s lay aside our routines and all those unnecessary details of life (and of this season) that draw us away from what is truly important. Then, like the shepherds, we can be sure that we will be drawn into the presence of Christ Who was born “for us men and for our salvation” on that Holy Night so many years ago.
Be assured of my prayerful best wishes as we celebrate the Nativity of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. May He Who was born of the Most Pure Theotokos, announced by angels, adored by the Shepherds, and visited by the Magi, bless you and yours with a joyful feast and grant that the New Year will be filled with many blessings.
Christ is born! Glorify Him!
With love in the Newborn Savior,
Father David