Shepherd | English Devotion | NHFCSG

Shepherd 

And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby keeping watch over their flocks at night." (Luke 2:8) 

It may seem like a stretch of a question, but try it anyway. If you were God, and could announce the arrival of the Savior of humanity on the very night, would you send your messengers to some shepherds out in the fields whiling away their night-time watch? Doesn't it seem like a waste? 

Why not send angels to an assembly of the religious council in Jerusalem? 

Why not to the megalomaniac King Herod to put him in his place in an instant? How about Caesar? 

Wouldn't that be a night of work--to blow open the doorways of society, to march right in and change everything. But instead, it was shepherds. 

Rough characters at that time, those laborers did the tedious things a lot of other people would have been unwilling to do. 

They smelled of the flocks, and were used to sleeping on the hard ground. There was a link, of course. A golden thread that connected the town of Bethlehem and two shepherds who lived a millennium apart. 

When David was at his best as king of Israel (and he had many less-thangood chapters in his life), he acted as the shepherd-king. 

He cared for the people just like he cared for sheep when he was a boy watching sheep in the fields outside Bethlehem. 

David could write the incredible words of Psalm 23 because he knew what it meant to be a good shepherd, and he knew that God was his good shepherd. 

"The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not be in want. He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters." And that isn't all. He guides. 

He protects with his rod and staff. Jesus, the Son of David, came to be the good shepherd. When Jesus spoke about it (John 10) he said that he knows us as his sheep, and we are to know him. 

He promised that he would defend us from wolves, and not run away. But most important, he said that the good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep. 

So consider this on the night when Jesus' life began in this world an inexorable process was set in motion, leading to the day he would lay down his life for the world.

That's what a true shepherd does. So an angelic vision to Bethlehem shepherds--men who understand feeding and guiding and saving--seems like the best way for chapter one to begin. 

Lets pray the lord`s Prayer: 

 The Lord is my shepherd. 

I shall not be in want. He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he restores my soul. 

He guides me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. 

You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. Surely goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever. (Psalm 23)