Silent Night, Holy Night!
Shepherds quake at the sight.
Glories stream from heaven afar
Heavenly hosts sing Alleluia,
Christ the Saviour is born!
Christ the Saviour is born.
This blogpost has come at a really fitting time, since we lit the third Advent candle at church yesterday. This candle represents joy and the shepherds who were the first to go to see the Baby Jesus. And when you read over the second verse of Silent Night, you can see that the shepherds are one of the focuses of this famous Christmas carol.
One of the ways that I love engaging with the Christmas story is spending time reflecting on what those involved would have felt at the time. For the shepherds, being faced with a heavenly host of angels, it would have been a truly terrifying scene. But hearing what the angels had to say and hearing the praises they were singing intrigued them enough to head down to Bethlehem to see what all the fuss was about.
When they got to Bethlehem and saw for themselves that what the angels shared to be true, they couldn't help but go out and praise God and share all the wonderful things they had seen:
"When they had seen Him, they spread the word concerning what had been told to them about this child, and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them."
Luke 2:17-18
Looking at the Christmas story and considering both the praise and wonder of the angels and the shepherds really helps me to reflect on the wonder of the Christmas story. So often I can just skim over the amazing parts of this story because I am so familiar with the story. But the shepherds went out and saw all the glories of God and praised Him for all the wonderful things He had done.
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