A Song of Peace

Introduction

Had there been newspapers in the Roman Empire almost 2,000 years ago, some of the headlines that month might have been:

CEASER DECLARED CHIEF PRIEST OF THE IMPERIAL CULT AND “FATHER OF THE COUNTRY”

GRAIN SHIPS DOCK, ROME RIOTS END

NINE PIRATE SHIPS SUNK BY SIXTH FLEET

ATHENS STUDENTS CLASH WITH POLICE

OLYMPIC WRESTLER STILL IN COMA

PHENOMENA ANGELS SIGHTED IN JUDEA

Such headlines look very much like the headlines in our newspapers today. For the world of the New Testament was a world very much like ours.

There were wars.

There was sickness.

There was poverty and injustice.

There were people who struggled to keep on living, living by habit long after they had lost any sense of purpose, meaning, or goal.

It was a world like ours, populated with people like ours. But God had made preparations. God was about to burst into this world of humanity. Jesus was about to be born, and after His birth our world, despite all its poverty and injustice, wars and terrorists, has never been the same.

Richards, L. O. (1987). The teacher’s commentary (p. 642). Victor Books.

As it was back then, so too church, I bring you news that will cause great joy for all the people (vs10)! Christ has come! In our context, Christ is coming again!

Promises Kept (vss 8-12)

God’s past faithfulness demands our present trust.

Part of the gospel is God putting on flesh (incarnation). He is preexisting before the creation of all things, He promised that He would remove the effects, works, and curse of sin, He would be born of the line of David, and it is in this time that we remember and celebrate that He is true to His word.

God put on flesh and walked among us. That through Him we see the Kingdom of God now and not yet.

This news had to get out! People had to be told! So the angels gathered together to tell the most powerful, significant, culturally influential, and most venerated people of the planet that the promised Savior had been born!!! (sic)

No… our text tells us, Luke 2:8–9 “And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified.”

What was the significance of saying it to the shepherds

Shepherds were poor and the rabbinic traditions labeled them as unclean.

Their jobs had high components of danger (warding off predators getting in between the sheep and predators) with very little compensation or appreciation.

John 10:12–13 “The hired hand is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it. The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.”

They were socially considered lowly and often times they were uneducated.

God in His wisdom, kindness, and with great intention revealed this cosmic sized event first to these men.

The child was born for the likes of the shepherds—the poor, the lowly, the rejected. He also came for the rich and the wise who later appear with gold, frankincense and myrrh. Bailey, Kenneth E.. Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes: Cultural Studies in the Gospels (p. 36). InterVarsity Press. Kindle Edition.

What were the angels saying… what was the significance of their words…

“Do not be afraid”…

What they were witnessing was unlike anything they had seen.

Church when God is doing something, this is quite possibly the most popular reaction we have to this work… fear. It breaks the status quo, it disrupts what we are used to, it upsets the rhythms/pace that we are used to. But God has so much more for us to learn of him, to learn how to love others, to take steps of faith to trust Him, that we might experience His fullness.

The shepherds are being invited to this new way of life… (MAYBE: It reminds me of a snippet of popular show by the name of Ted Lasso… Explain what goes on… “Be curious, not judgmental”)

Today is the DAY… the one you’ve been waiting for… TODAY the Christ has been born. The one you’ve been hearing about in synagogue all these years. It’s that day you never thought would come. Or maybe you never knew if you would see it in your lifetime.

Gods promises are tangible, understandable, and true.

The promise was tangible, understandable, and identifiable.

“the baby would be wrapped in cloths, lying in a manger”

The angels anticipated this anxiety and told the shepherds they would find the baby wrapped (which was what peasants, like shepherds, did with their newly born children). Furthermore, they were told that he was lying in a manger! That is, they would find the Christ child in an ordinary peasant home such as theirs. He was not in a governor’s mansion or a wealthy merchant’s guest room but in a simple two-room home like theirs. This was really good news. Perhaps they would not be told, “Unclean shepherds—be gone!” This was their sign, a sign for lowly shepherds. Bailey, Kenneth E.. Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes: Cultural Studies in the Gospels (p. 35). InterVarsity Press. Kindle Edition.

I also think it is very significant that Jesus would call himself the Bread of Life and that He has come that we might have life. John 6:51 “I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.””

God in the flesh makes Himself approachable to all people. No matter your vocation, no matter your walk of life, no matter the great wealth, no matter an empty bank account, no matter the family you were born into (whether you know them or not), Jesus welcomes you and has made Himself available to know, to love, welcomed into a new family, to see Him as He is that you might know true love and worship Him. THIS IS THE GOOD NEWS!

Proclaiming the Kept Promises (vss 13-15)

Those who are before God’s throne burst forth with praise (what do they see maybe we don’t)

Luke 2:13–14 “Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.””

Credible witnesses

Angels see the glory of God. They see the majesty of God. They revere and honor God for who He is.

Peter talks about the grace that we have recieved and how angels are in awe and wonder about it 1 Peter 1:10–12 “Concerning this salvation, the prophets, who spoke of the grace that was to come to you, searched intently and with the greatest care, trying to find out the time and circumstances to which the Spirit of Christ in them was pointing when he predicted the sufferings of the Messiah and the glories that would follow. It was revealed to them that they were not serving themselves but you, when they spoke of the things that have now been told you by those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven. Even angels long to look into these things.”

Here in our text in Luke they see what is happening and can’t help but burst forth and praising God in unison…

GLORY TO GOD

On Earth, Peace to those on whom his favor rests

To have the favor of God…

The shepherds felt favored, no doubt.

But who else is does God favor.

John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that he showed it in this way, that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

Beloved, if you are here or have heard of the good news of the gospel, that God has brought not only peace between us and Him in the person of Jesus Christ, but that He has a plan and purpose for you… may that fill you with PEACE

The Bible speaks to those things that have no purpose as NOTHING or as to NOT EXIST. We may feel this way in lonliness or lack of purpose. BE ENCOURAGED… YOU ARE LOVED… YOU HAVE VALUE… YOU HAVE PURPOSE IN GOD’S KINGDOM… and may that FILL YOU with a SENSE OF PEACE… for you are more valuable than all of Creation!

This peace is the peace that Jesus has created between us and God.

We can not think about this enough. We can not talk about this enough. If we feel that we have, we do not understand 1) the wickedness of our own sin or 2) the gravity and enormity of God’s holiness being informed by his grace, kindness, compassion, justice, and love.

Because of sin we are hopeless… we have nothing to contribute, very minimal at most. We are at war with God. We like Adam and Eve are wanting to be our own God, we are determining what is God’s to determine, that which is good, right, beautiful, and true. In sin we are enemies of God because we are saying to Him, I’ve got this, I don’t need you. The hammer saying to the carpenter, I can do this myself, I don’t need you.

Because of Jesus, an allegiance to Him above all else, we repent of sin and we follow Him doing all that he taught us to do in word and through his actions, we have peace with God. When Jesus is Lord of our lives, we enter into new life and are at PEACE with God.

Jesus has not only saved us from sin, but He has saved us to everlasting life with Him. That no matter what we go through, he is with us. That one day we will be where he is and right now, he is here with us.

Promises of Peace (vss 16-20)

The Angels departed and the shepherds turned and said, let’s go see!

They had an idea, but they hadn’t seen the baby yet.

They knew that they were to go as they were…

Uninvited guests they just show up and they find Jesus.

This is really those of us who know Jesus… this is what we GET to do, we GET to tell others of what we have found and what we have seen.

This is a monumental shift in the trajectory of the Bible and the role of those who follow Jesus.

Israel was to be those peculiar people. The ones that the Lord was their God and they would attract people from all over the world to see the living God. It was a COME and SEE.

We are starting here to see the gospel writers move to a GO and TELL. It’s an arrows out. It’s a shift.

They went and told all who would listen and they were amazed.

What they had been told matched up to what they saw… they knew with out a dobut that this was Jesus and that the words of the angels were true.

Extra… if I have time

Mary treasured these things in her heart.

ἡ δὲ ⸀Μαριὰμ πάντα συνετήρει τὰ ῥήματα ταῦτα συμβάλλουσα ἐν τῇ καρδίᾳ αὐτῆς.

Aland, K., Aland, B., Karavidopoulos, J., Martini, C. M., & Metzger, B. M. (2012). Novum Testamentum Graece (28th Edition, Lk 2:19). Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft.

συνετήρει- To hold onto, store, remember, keep, defend, preserve

συμβάλλουσα- to think deeply, to consider carefully

Mary had knowledge and experience beyond what these shepherds had. With the possibility of reading too much into the text, I think this is here for us who have known Jesus for sometime (and those who are new to their commitment to Jesus).

Journal, write down, remember, protect, cherish and think deeply on the things of God, what he is doing, what he has done, and what you sense he will do.

Life is tough. Life is hard. Life throws us at times in situations and environments that we would not choose for ourselves were we given the opporutunity.

But God’s favor has not been removed from us. We are to cherish these experiences that we have had with God, those things and times where we know that we know that God is with us, protect, keep, ponder, and seriously consider these things as they will help us navigate the most difficult of times.

Mary would ultimately witness the most horrible thing that could happen to any mother. She would see her son publicly murdered. It was these things that she cherished, protected, kept, and deeply pondered that I believe carried her through. Mary was a human, just like you and me, and she experienced the temptations, the desires to compromise, the desire to keep those she loved safe at any cost, but what I think the Bible tells us, right here specifically… it was these moments that she would draw on later in her mosts disorienting and most tragic times of her life.