Week 4 Christmas Challenge, Awestruck & Awesome.Sample

Luke 2:16-20(NIV): “So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger. When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them. But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.”

Those shepherds! They’d never be the same again! Neither would you, had you experienced millions of angels brighter than a million suns engaged in full-hearted, full-throated adoring, declarative chanting worship! 

Look at them! They ‘hurried off’. It was the priority—it topped sleep, breakfast, vocational responsibilities, propriety (in that there is nothing to suggest it was a sane hour of the morning)! There’s an example for us. 

They found the baby. In other words, they didn’t give up. While it isn’t clear at all that morning had fully come, it isn’t at all clear that the first feeding trough the bumped into held the Lord Yahweh Jesus Christ, either. So, it is quite likely, they were waking up animals in town, and their owners, with the fuss they were stirring in in the pre-dawn hours looking for this miraculous event. It is plausible that this hunt lasted for awhile—although the number of feeding troughs in a town of a thousand couldn’t have been outrageous. When we’re searching for Jesus and His work in our lives, it may be quite likely that we offend the people around us who don’t understand our priorities. It is also plausible that it will take some perseverance to find what we’re looking for…

Then, in one of the most under-rated miracles in the Bible, the shepherds, having encountered Jesus, immediately transmogrify into evangelists (verse 17)! They spread the word! We doubt Jesus or Mary or Joseph told them to, and there is no record of the angels instructed them to. It’s just the (super)natural response to encountering Jesus—you want to tell others! You are so overwhelmed—some might say ‘awestruck’!—that you overflow with the joy and love that accompanies the joyous good news that you have to share with everyone else. 

In practice these days, not ‘all who heard it’ start friendships with Jesus—but in the shepherds’ experience, all were amazed. They found it ‘awesome’.

The shepherds are our example, and so is Mary. Yes, we ‘spread the word’ with everyone we encounter. But, we also treasure up all these things and ponder them in our hearts. We are awestruck and it is awesome!

Think about who you might want to share your experience of God’s incredible love with today. Then pray for them. Go out of your way to get in their way with inclusive, other’s focused Good News of radical Grace. What a joy!

The painting from Day 1, 'Making Room for Justice' is from an upcoming book by Bette Dickinson called, Making Room in Advent: 25 Devotions for a Season of Wonder scheduled to be published by InterVarsity Press in Fall 2022. The book will include original paintings and devotional readings in Luke 1-2.