![[Paiting of the shepherds visit to the manger]](https://www.deankwilson.com/Blog_images/shepherds_visit_the_manger.jpg)
| They [The shepherds] hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby [Jesus], 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… 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 exactly as they had been told. |
| —Luke 2:16-20/span> |
Later, after the events described in the Scripture passage at the beginning of this blog post took place, the shepherds spoke to everyone who crossed their pathway:
“We couldn’t sit still. We couldn’t stay where we were. We had to get up. We had to start moving. We had to fairly run and run as fast as we could. We had to—we just had to go and see this miracle that the angel had told us about.
It was as if we couldn’t control our own legs. As fast as we could, we gathered our sheep and moved faster than we had ever moved before until we reached the stable where the baby was resting in a manger surrounded by his mother and father. We found them there exactly as we were told.”
I do not know when you dear ones reading this blog post first heard about Jesus. I can share with you that I cannot remember a time in my life when I did not know about Jesus.
I attribute this to the fact that, within days of my adoptive parents picking me up from the place where the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania had insisted I be sequestered for six weeks after my birth, I was laying in my mother’s arms in church. As I grew older and began to attend Sunday School, I had many wonderful teachers share with me about Jesus. So, it is no surprise that I cannot remember a time in my life when I did not know about Jesus.
Perhaps you, dear one, had an experience similar to my own. Or, maybe you first heard about Jesus as a teenager when one of your friends invited you to attend church with him or her. It is possible that you didn’t really learn about Jesus until you were in college, or maybe even as an adult. It is also possible that you did not hear about Jesus, or truly understand who He was, until you had reached middle age or even older.
Whatever your particular circumstance, if you are reading this blog post, it is almost certain that you are someone who at some point in your life came to know about Jesus. It is also very likely that once you came to know about Him, there came a time in your life when you realized what Jesus had done for you—that He had died to forgive your sins and to re-connect you with the God who loves you with His everlasting love.
As someone who sincerely believes in what scholars call “Reformed theology,” I believe that, if what I have written describes you, then in fact, you are someone who, before the foundation of the earth, God chose to claim you as His very own special child. I also believe that, at some point in your life, God sent His Holy Spirit to guide you to a place where you had the opportunity to come to understand the great gift of salvation that God had given you through the Lord Jesus Christ. I also believe that upon coming to an understanding of what God had done for you, through Jesus, you were irresistibly drawn to Him.
In response to what God has chosen to reveal to you about Himself and about His precious Son, Jesus, you have responded in the only reasonable way and have done exactly what God intended you to do. And, you continue to do that right up to this present moment. As you read God’s written Word, the Bible, you strive each day to do exactly what you are told to do.
When the shepherds had their encounter with Jesus, they went out from that experience miraculously changed. They had met the Son of God. Even though Jesus was a baby, His divine presence was so embued by the power of God that the shepherds went out praising God and telling others that they had found Jesus in the exact manner in which the angel had described.
That is one of the most amazing things about an encounter with the living Lord Jesus Christ. Once we meet Him, we find that He is exactly what we have been told. And, having encountered Jesus, we find ourselves overwhelmed with a desire to tell others what He has done for us, what He means to us, and what He longs to do for them.
And that, my dear ones, is the heart of the gospel. We have found good news of great joy. And, we want to share that good news with everyone who crosses the pathway of our lives.
