The Birth of Jesus Christ

Okay, I'm going to go through this fairly quickly today. Probably won't have a lot of time for discussion, but I have to get down to springs here. Today we will be talking about, as I mentioned, the birth of Jesus Christ. By way of background, a little bit of review, because it's been a month since we've had the class. We have been covering the story of the background material leading up to the birth of Jesus Christ. We talked about the genealogies of Mary and Joseph. We talked about the fact that conditions had to be right for the coming of the Messiah to establish a church and to have the conditions under which the gospel could be spread. One of those conditions was, as we talked about, the peace of Rome, the Pax Romana of the Roman Empire that allowed peace so that circumstances were right for the gospel to flourish there. We also talked about the appearance of the angel Gabriel to the priest Zechariah as he is giving the offering of incense in the temple, and how Gabriel appeared to him and told him that his wife Elizabeth would give birth to a son, and the son would be the one to prepare the way for the coming of the Lord, which, of course, was John the Baptist. We also talked about Gabriel's appearance to the young lady Mary, or Merriam, and told her that she would supernaturally conceive and give birth to the Messiah.

And then we talked about Mary's visit with Elizabeth and how the baby John leapt in Elizabeth's womb there. And then we also talked about how an angel appeared to Joseph in a dream to tell him to go ahead and take Mary to be his wife, and that the baby conceived within her was of the Holy Spirit, and that he would be the one who would save Israel from their sins.

We talked about the timing of the conception of Elizabeth and Mary, and how Jesus was most likely born on the Feast of Trumpets or the first day of the Feast of Tabernacles.

So today we'll pick up the story with that background in Luke 2 and verse 1 with the circumstances of the actual birth of Jesus the Messiah. So reading here in Luke 2, we'll go through verses 1 through 20, hopefully today. And it came to pass in those days that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered, a census, in other words. And Caesar Augustus is the nephew and adopted son of Julius Caesar, the famous Roman emperor.

Caesar Augustus reigned from 27 BC to AD 14. So he is the emperor up until Jesus is about 18 years old. And the Roman emperor, of course, is ruling over the whole area around the Mediterranean, including the Holy Land there. This census, as Luke tells us, first took place while Carinius was governing Syria. Carinius was the Roman official there. He was a personal friend and advisor to Caesar Augustus, too. And skipping down a bit through some of the material here for time's sake, verse 3, So all went to be registered, every one to his own city. Now, some people have wondered about this, why the Romans would have ordered people to return to their own towns or cities to be registered for a census. And some years ago were even saying that Luke must have been wrong about this, because it makes no sense. However, at least three different documents, primarily papyrus documents from Egypt, have been found dating back to the first and second centuries that show how the Romans indeed ordered people to return to their hometowns for a census. And just as evidence of this, I'll quote one of them for you here.

Gaius vivius maximus, the prefect of Egypt, orders, seeing that the time has come for the house-to-house census, it is necessary to compel all those who for any cause whatsoever are reciting outside their districts to return to their own homes, that they may both carry out the regular order of the census and may also diligently attend to the cultivation of their allotments to take care of their fields, in other words, there. So here we see an actual example where a Roman official is ordering people to return to their hometowns for specifically for a census. And again, this is one of three such documents that have been found. As we discussed in some of the previous classes, God used His external circumstances to carry out His plan. We talked earlier about how God used the conditions that existed in the Roman Empire, the Pax Romana, the Peace of Rome, the Roman road system, the universality of the Greek language, and the Roman male system to create the conditions for the church to flourish and for the gospel to go out there in that period. They didn't have these things before, so the time had to be right for the conditions to be fulfilled, for the church to be established, for the Messiah to be born, and for the message of the kingdom to go out to the world. And now God is using an even more specific circumstance, which is Augustus' desire to have a census throughout the empire to bring to pass the fulfillment of the birth of Jesus Christ as it had been foretold. So continuing in verse 4, Joseph also went up from Galilee out of the city of Nazareth into Judea to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be registered with Mary, his betrothed wife, who was with child. So there are several things to consider here. Let's take a look at a map. This is the same map that's on the back of your harmony. And what we're talking about, they're living up at Nazareth up here in the Galilee area, named after the Sea of Galilee.

And they're going to be traveling down to Jerusalem and to Bethlehem down south of that.

And when Scripture talks about going up to Jerusalem, today we tend to think of going up as traveling north, because that's the way our maps are oriented. That's not the way they viewed it in biblical times. The language there is talking about going up in elevation or altitude.

Nazareth is about 400 feet above sea level, and Jerusalem is at about 2800 feet above sea level. So anywhere you are in the country, you're going up to Jerusalem because it's located along this central spine of mountains here in the heart of the Holy Land. And again, here's Jerusalem down here. So wherever you are in the country to go to Jerusalem, you have to go up. So that's why that phrase appears over and over again in Scripture. Now, something to consider. We covered when we talked about the genealogy several classes ago that both Joseph and Mary are descendants of David.

And David's hometown is Bethlehem, down south of Jerusalem. And they have to travel there. That's why they have to travel there for the census. So if their ancestors, their families, are from Bethlehem, why are Joseph and Mary living—you know, here's Bethlehem down here—why are they living about 100 miles north up here in the Galilee area? Ever ask yourself that question?

Well, there are two historical factors that are at work here that aren't mentioned in the Gospels that may help us understand the answer to that question. One of these answers is to understand a little bit about the history of the Galilee region. It was part of the northern kingdom of Israel as opposed to Judah, kingdom of Judah in the south. And, of course, the Assyrians invaded, came down and deported all of the Israelites out of that area there and replaced them with Gentiles, with people from other areas. And also, large parts of this territory they know from archaeological studies, it was largely vacant, the land there, the towns that we read about, Capernaum, Magdala, Bethsaida, places like this, were uninhabited up until a century or so before we read about these events here. And what happened is the Jews, of course, and Israelites, being very familiar with their Bible, knew that there was a prophecy that the Messiah would appear in Galilee. Let's read that prophecy. It's over in Isaiah 9, verses 1 and 2.

The land of Zebulun and the land of Naftali. By the way of the sea, this is the main road that ran up just along the northern shore of Capernaum, all the way from Egypt in the south along the Mediterranean coast. Actually, let me back up here. Ran from Egypt along here and up past Megiddo and around here, then on up to Syria and on over all the way to Babylon and the empires of the east. So that's the way of the sea that it's talking about. It's not talking about by the Mediterranean Sea. Beyond the Jordan and Galilee of the Gentiles, the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwelt in the land of the shadow of death, upon them a light has shined. So the Jews read the Scripture and realized that the Messiah is going to appear up in the area of Zebulun and Naftali, where those two tribes of Israel were.

Now, where did Jesus Christ conduct His ministry? Well, He began in Nazareth and then later on moved to Capernaum over here in the Sea of Galilee. Which two tribes were those two cities located in? Nazareth is located in the territory of Zebulun. Capernaum is in the territory of Naftali. So Jesus was indeed fulfilling this prophecy. Now, the Jews reading this, a lot of them in the century or two before the events we read about here, migrated because, again, a lot of this land is vacant. Going back to the time of the Assyrian invasion centuries before, they move in and they start founding these towns like Capernaum, Bethsaida, Tiberias, places like this, Nazareth even. So there's this mass migration of Jews into this area.

And that's also why we read through the Gospels and you read about Christ's confrontations with Pharisees and Sadducees—well, not so much Sadducees, but scribes and religious authorities. And we kind of automatically think, well, that's taking place in Jerusalem, not so.

A lot of that's actually taking place up in Galilee. And it's taking place up there because it is religious Jews who have moved in and settled this area and founded these towns there.

So when you think about that, you know, it's not just in Jerusalem where Jesus has confrontations with the religious authorities. A lot of that's taking place up in these towns as well there.

So this is one historical factor that is taking place here. And why Joseph or Joseph's family descendants may be having moved from down in Bethlehem near Jerusalem up here to the Galilee region is because they're possibly a part of this migration of religious Jews into this area.

Now there's another reason why Joseph in particular may have ended up up here as well, because why is Joseph's occupation? He's a craftsman. A lot of people think a carpenter. I think he's actually a stone mason. I'll discuss that in a future class here. But in the years leading up to this time, who is the ruler over Judea? Herod the Great. What's Herod called? He's called the Great Builder because he's doing these fabulous construction projects like the Jerusalem Temple here. Where does he get his labor? A lot of it is conscripted. In other words, drafted out of the local population there. Where's Bethlehem? It's about six miles south of Jerusalem.

So Herod is drawing on this labor force for his major construction projects like this.

There's another huge construction project that's going on at the same time, again just a few miles from Bethlehem. It's called the Herodium. How many of you have ever heard about that? The Herodium.

It's really interesting because we go there today from southern Jerusalem in the Bethlehem area. You look out and you see what looks for all the world like a volcano out on the horizon a few miles away. And it's not. It's this man-made mountain. What Herod did is he built this huge palace complex down here. He built a swimming pool in here that's about an acre and a half in size.

Mind you, this is in the desert, but it's fed by aqueducts. He's got a man-made island out on the middle of it there where he can have private conferences with other officials and so on without anybody overhearing. So he puts it out in the middle of the lake so they can see anybody. He's got absolute privacy out there. And he builds this fortress palace. There's this hill here.

And what he did is he took off the top half of another hill over here and moved it and put it on top of this hill and then built inside and on top of it a palace fortress that's about eight or ten stories high. This is what it looks like today, an aerial photo, looking down almost straight down from it. You can see the size of it here from these vehicles over here in the parking lot. And he liked this place so much that he ordered that his tomb be built there. And indeed, Herod's tomb was only found just a few years ago on the slopes of it about right here.

It's interesting we'll talk about this in the future. When Jesus talks about faith to move mountains, he says that on the Mount of Olives, you look out to the south, you see a mountain that a man moved. It's an allusion to Herod and the Herodium there. One of those interesting things in the Gospels, if you don't know the history and the geography, it goes right over our heads there. Jesus is talking about somebody who literally can move mountains. So anyway, where was I here?

I got sidetracked here. So if you are Joseph living near Bethlehem, and you know Herod is conscripting all of these laborers into his labor force to build the temple and the Herodium and his other various projects and so on, and you don't want to be a part of that, what are you going to do? Well, you're probably going to move up north, a hundred miles away, up to Galilee.

So you're far out of the reach of Herod and his construction projects up there. So that's another possibility as to why it could be that we find Joseph up in that area. Here's a ground-level view of part of Herod's palace complex and the pool there and the island in the middle of it and this massive, massive mountain overlooking the whole thing there. Just a huge, huge project. You can see the size of it by the modern road that goes up there.

And his tomb was found right up in this area there, overlooking this palace complex here. So now we have Joseph and Mary living up north in Nazareth, about a hundred miles north of Jerusalem. But according to prophecy, where is the Messiah to be born? Anybody remember the prophecy of that? Well, Micah 5 and verse 2, But you, Bethlehem, Ephrathah, though you are little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of you shall come forth to me the one to be ruler in Israel, whose goings forth are from old from everlasting.

So here's a clear prophecy that the Messiah is to be born in Bethlehem, not up in Nazareth, not up in Galilee. Yes, He's going to work up in Galilee in Nazareth, but He's not going to be born there. His birth is to come from Bethlehem there. So how does God then arrange to have Joseph and Mary move from Galilee down to Bethlehem so that the Messiah can be born there in accordance with prophecy? And not just that, but also according to the timing of His holy days. So Jesus would be born on most likely the Feast of Trumpets or the first day of the Feast of Tabernacles.

Well, again, as we talked about in earlier classes, God is a God of planning, a God of purpose, a God of perfection, everything that He does. And He uses external circumstances, like the Roman Empire we talked about earlier, to bring the conditions to be right for the appearance of the Messiah. And now He's using the desire of the Roman Emperor Caesar Augustus to bring to pass the conditions for this prophecy to be fulfilled.

It's really quite remarkable, if you think about it, the things that God will do to carry out His plan and purpose to bring it there to pass. So I'm not saying it had to be done this way. I'm just saying that it did happen this way, and God was working with this. I think He could have done it any number of ways to get Joseph and Mary down there to Bethlehem. But He did use these particular circumstances, according to the Gospels, to bring it to pass and have prophecy fulfilled this way, so that, as we talked about earlier too, the bread of life, Jesus Christ, would be born in Bethlehem, whose name means house of bread.

You have the bread of life being born, coming into the world in a town that we would call today Bakerville or Bakertown or something like that, house of bread. So again, little things like this in the Scripture, if you don't understand the background and the language, again, they go right over our heads.

So that's why He spent a lot of time helping bring out a lot of these details here, because the Gospels truly are treasure troves of information there for us. So continuing the story now in Luke 2 and verse 6, so it was that while they were there, the days were completed for her to be delivered.

How many times have you ever read over that verse and skipped totally over while they were there? I know I have dozens of times. But think about the implications of that. This is not saying that Joseph and Mary show up there at five minutes till midnight, and the local Motel 6 in Bethlehem is full, and there's no room for them. It says while they were there, implying obviously that they are there for some period of time. And while they were there, the time comes for Mary to deliver her baby.

Doesn't mean they showed up there, as the popular story is, at the last minute they can't find a room because the inn is full and all of that, which is another story we'll get into in a minute here.

So, in other words, they have been there for some time already when it comes time for Mary to give birth to Jesus. How long they've been there, we don't know. But it obviously is not a situation where Joseph has been an irresponsible husband, and he brings his nine-month pregnant wife there on this long journey, and they just barely managed to find a place there at the last minute for to give birth. No, they've been there for some time there, no doubt for the census, but probably also for the fall holy days as well. So, verse 7, and she brought forth her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling clothes and lay him in a manger because there was no room for them in the inn. Let's notice several things here that are brought out in this verse. First of all, it says her firstborn son. As we talked about last time, why call him firstborn son if Jesus was her only son, as Catholicism teaches. No, it says her firstborn son, meaning there were others. And as we talked about last time, she had at least four other sons who were named in the Gospels and at least two daughters as well. So again, Luke is very careful in choosing the words that he used to say exactly what he means. Next, it says here, they laid him in a manger because there was no room for them in the inn. And it's from this line that people get the idea that Jesus is born in a barn and he's surrounded by the cattle and the sheep and the donkeys and the camels and all this other stuff. But when we look at this from a standpoint of archaeology and first century culture, we get quite a different picture of what is transpiring here. So let's look at this more closely. Let's look first at this word translated inn. It's the Greek word kataluma. Here, kataluma.

And it means simply guest room. Guest room. So use several other places. We don't have time to go through that. There is a perfectly good Greek word that means inn. And Luke uses it elsewhere in the parable of the Good Samaritan. And that's found over in Luke 10, verse 34, just to review it.

So he, the Good Samaritan, went to him, the man who'd been beaten and left for dead by the robbers, and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. And he set him on his own animal, brought him to inn, different word, pandochion, not kataluma, pandochion, and took care of him. So there is a perfectly good Greek word for inn that Luke uses elsewhere. But that's not the word that he's using back here in Luke 2.

So really what this is saying literally in the Greek here in Luke 2, in verse 1, is, lay them in a manger because there was no space. A room there could be translated that word, but it's a Greek word that means space, any kind of space. Not a room, as opposed to a specifically defined area, but space. There was no room, you know, in a more expansive view, as we would use the word room today, because there was no space for them in the guest room.

It's quite a different picture from what the old Christmas nativity scenes that we've seen and heard about for some of the years. So let's take a little closer look at what's being talked about here. Here's an illustration of a typical first century house of Judea at that time. Cutaway view here. Doesn't mean they have these huge skylights there, so you look in. But, yeah, cutaway view on several areas here.

So let's talk about this a minute. You have their living room, which is what it meant. You did everything. You lived in that room. It's where you cooked. You have the lady here at the hearth oven cooking. You have the bed material over here that would be spread out on the floor at nighttime. All of their possessions would be stored in here. Even their food. Food is here actually stored in these bins built into the walls here.

It'd be like, you know, our space is between two by fours in the walls that would be filled with grain, with openings, so they could let the grain out. So it's a food storage there within the walls. So you have this living room area that was where the family did pretty much everything. And notice here over the side, though, behind this wall there's this little narrow space in there. That is the kataluma. That is the guest room, because hospitality was very important to people in that day and age. And they would have large, extended families, and whenever a family member, friend, relative would be passing through, they knew that they could always stay in the guest room there.

Again, you have that kind of hospitality in that part of the world to this day. It's very common there. So every house, basically, regardless of how big or how small, had a guest room in it, a kataluma that is being talked about here. So when it says there was no room in the guest room, that's what it's talking about, this little small room, basically just big enough for one or two people to sleep in there. And that's about it. So with a baby coming—Mary is nine months pregnant now—with a baby coming, there is either no space in the kataluma, because other family members or visitors are occupying it.

Again, Bethlehem is only about six miles from Jerusalem. So during the holy day season, relatives probably would have stayed there as well. So they might have been staying in the kataluma. Or there's simply not enough space. Maybe the room is too small for three people, for Joseph and Mary and a newborn baby. So what did they do then? And how does the newborn Jesus end up in a manger?

What's this talk about? Again, looking at the context of the first century culture, other than the house itself, what's the most valuable possession of a first century farmer? It's animals. It's animals. Good question. Animals are very valuable. If you had a good goat, the goat could give several quarts of milk a day. That would be enough for your family, your kids. The animals were needed for wool, fiber for clothing, and so on, as in cheap shearing, and so on.

They were valuable for meat. If you had chickens, they would be valuable for giving eggs as a source of food for the family. So where would you keep your most valuable possessions? You'd keep them in the house. So a lot of houses were built around a small shallow cave, or they would have what we might call a sub-basement today, and at night, to keep the animals safe, because they are your most valuable asset after your house, they would bring the animals in inside to keep them from being stolen, from carried away by wolves, or hyenas, or wild dogs, or something like that.

They would bring the animals in to this area underneath the house that actually opened up into the house, in a lot of cases like that.

And you can see in here a couple of mangers where the sheep and the goats are eating there.

So what would happen? The farmers, the peasants, would bring their animals inside at night, where they would be safe from harm. They also, on the cold nights, the animals' body heat would help warm the small house as well, so it was valuable from that standpoint. And in the morning, then they would take the animals back out to pasture or pens, or wherever they kept them during the day. Usually the kids would then go out and be the shepherds to watch over the animals as they're out in the pastures and fields and so on. So this is what this is talking about. It's not a separate barn. It's actually an area underneath the main living area of the house where the animals would be kept. This sounds quite odd to us, but there are actually at least two other references to this practice in the Bible. One is 1 Samuel 28 and verse 24. It says, Now the woman had a fatted calf in the house. It's talking about this practice, keeping your valuable animals in the house. In this case, a fatted calf that is to be prepared and used for a meal at some point. You don't want to lose the calf out there to wolf or dogs or hyenas or something. Another one, you may remember the story of Jephthah, the judge, and what happened to him.

Jephthah made a vow to the Eternal and said, If you will indeed deliver the people of Ammon into my hands, then it shall be that whatever, not whoever, whatever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me when I return in peace from the people of Ammon, shall surely be the Eternals, and I will offer it up as a burnt offering. Why does he say this? Because he's obviously expecting one of the animals to come out of the house. And he is shocked and grieved when it's his daughter that comes out instead. This is a sideways reference to that same practice of keeping the animals in the house. And Jephthah makes a vow thinking that his sheep or goat is going to come out, and he'll offer that as a burnt sacrifice there to God. And thanks.

Again, this may sound a little bit odd to us, but here's a photograph of one of these areas that exists even to this day underneath a house here. And here's a photograph of what would have been the manger. This is a... nearly everything is limestone in Israel, so it's a fairly soft rock, easy to shape. So here they've just carved out a manger, a feed trough, you might say, out of a freestanding block of limestone. If they didn't have that, they might carve them into the bedrock itself of this area underneath the house, or make one out of plaster or something like that. Wood was a fairly rare material, so they didn't just use it for something like the manger in the traditional nativity scene. A wooden box with legs and fill a straw in all of this. No, they didn't have those. They used stone, generally, for that, because it was a much more abundant material. So what's happening, which is being talked about here then, is Joseph and Mary, because there's no room or not enough room in the guest room, they moved down into this area underneath the house where the animals would have been kept. And this is actually advantageous to them, because they're going to have privacy down there. They're going to have more room than in this tiny little guest room. And also, I might mention, too, after the animals are kept there overnight, they'll go through and clean it out in the morning, take out the manure, the waste, and so on. And that will be actually set out in the sun to dry and later used as fuel for cooking fires, which you also find referred to in the Scripture as well. People were so poor then they couldn't afford to let anything go to waste. So the fertilizer would be used either—the manure would be used for fertilizer on the fields or dried and used as fuel for fires there. So this is really what this is talking about here in this story. This is the real story of the Circumstances of Christ's birth. And again, it's quite different from the traditional picture of all of this. So I read through that fairly quickly there. Any questions about any of this that I've covered here? Yes, Paul?

It's a personal practice. I think I've read some of this.

You know, I have heard about that now that you mentioned it. I was thinking— Right, right. Yeah, you don't want to—certainly don't want to lose a valuable animal to leave it outside to freeze overnight. Yeah, you bring it inside. Yes, Bruce?

Mm-hmm.

Oh, huh. Uh-huh.

Sure. Yeah, yeah, that makes sense, too. Mm-hmm. It wouldn't surprise me if this is still practiced in areas like Iraq or Afghanistan or other areas, parts of the Middle East there to this day. Again, it's a very practical way to do it there. Keep your animals safe and make maximum use of your space there. Yes, Sam?

Right. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, that works well in colder weather and warmer weather. We'll probably touch on it—well, we will touch on this at some point. Yeah, the people would actually move out of the house and sleep on the roofs at night. You find reference to that various places in the Bible, like King David, when he sees Bathsheba out bathing on a roof at night. It says it's a warm night and David is out cooling off walking around on the rooftop of his palace there on this night, and events transpired from there. Anyway, let's move on to the remainder of the story then, continuing on in verse 8. I get past it. Okay. So it says, Now there were in the same country shepherds living out in the fields, keeping watch over their flocks by night. I'd like to give you just a few quotes from other sources, since we're not the only ones who believe. This tells us quite a bit about the timing of these events. This is from Adam Clark's commentary. As these shepherds had not yet brought home their flocks, it is a presumptive argument that October had not yet commenced, and that consequently our Lord was not born on the 25th of December when no flocks were out in the fields, nor could he have been born later than September as the flocks were still in the fields by night. On this very ground, the nativity in December should be given up. Clark's commentary note on this verse, a few other sources, interpreters, one volume commentary, These humble pastoral folk are out in the field at night with their flock, a feature of the story which would argue against the birth of Christ, occurring on December 25th, since the weather would not have permitted it.

Another one, this is next to her for some books, Celebrations, the Complete Book of American Holidays. Luke's account suggests that Jesus may have been born in summer or early fall. Since December is cold and rainy in Judea, it is likely the shepherds would have sought shelter for their flocks at night. And one final one, this is regarding the Romans. Since this taking place at this time, it could hardly have been at that season, December 25th, however, for such a time would surely not have been chosen by the authorities for public enrollment, which necessitated the populations traveling from all parts of their natal districts, storms and rain, making journeys both unsafe and unpleasant in winter, except in specially favorable years. From Christmas at Bethlehem, Holy Days and Holidays by Cunningham Geeky. So again, we're not the only ones who recognize this. Personally, I've been after the feast. The latest I've been in Israel is the first week of November, and it was one of the coldest times I've had in my life, because I just brought warm clothing there for the feast and stayed over several weeks. And as soon as the feast was over, it turned rainy and cold. And it actually snowed over in Ammon that year. This is 2005.

And it was just miserably cold there in Jerusalem at that time, and Bethlehem's same elevation basically is Jerusalem. So no, shepherds are not going to be out there at night with their flocks and winter like that. And the Romans certainly are not going to be calling a census for that time of year, because it's self-defeating. Any Roman official who ordered a census at that time of year would have been demoted, at the very least, probably exiled to Rome's equivalent of Siberia or made a slave or whatever, for sheer stupidity of ordering a census at that time of year, because it would be self-defeating to try to get people to travel to their home areas in that period. November, December, January, time frame there. It's a miserable time to travel and be out at that time of year. So moving on, then, so when the Son of God is born in the flesh to Joseph and Mary, who does God choose to tell about this event? There's another lesson here for us here.

Does He send somebody to tell the priests? Does He send somebody to tell the Levites? Does He send somebody to tell Herod or the other rulers? They're aristocracy. No, He chooses to tell a group of shepherds who are out mining their own business out in their fields in the middle of the night there. Now, shepherds, we read things like Psalm 23, and we think, Oh, what a noble profession. You know, the Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want, and so on. But that's not the way shepherds were viewed in the first century, because shepherds were actually viewed by many of the rabbis as unclean. Now, why is that? Well, think about it. What does sheep do? Sheep wander all over the landscape there, if you let them out. So sheep are going to be eating grass from whatever field, whatever property they're near. And because a shepherd can't necessarily control everywhere the sheep go, the sheep go to where there's grass to eat sheep and goats, so because of that, the shepherds could not make restitution to the people whose property the sheep grazed on.

So by extension, the shepherds are thieves, knowing thieves, perpetual unrepentant thieves, because their sheep are stealing the grass that they're eating out of other people's fields and property, and so on. So according to a lot of the rabbis of the first century, shepherding was an unclean profession, just like you were a leper or something like that. Shepherds were not looked on as noble in all of this. They were the outcasts of that time and that culture. So who does God choose to tell first about the coming and the birth of His Son? A bunch of shepherds who were out in the fields minding their own business there when an angel suddenly shows up and scares them, spittles there, and appears to them. So continuing the story here with that background, again something if you don't know the culture, it goes right past us here. And behold, an angel of the Lord stood before them the shepherds and the glory of the Lord shown around them, and they were greatly afraid. Same reaction again that we saw with Zechariah and with Mary when this hole opens up and the space-time continuum and this being steps through from another dimension and gives them this message. And what does the angel say? Same thing that he said to Zechariah and Mary, Do not be afraid, because that's the natural reaction there to people, to this experience. For behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people. For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior who is Christ the Lord. And this will be the sign to you. You will find a bay wrapped in swaddling clothes lying in a manger. The swaddling clothes is basically strips of linen in which a newborn baby would be bound to make it feel comfortable and warm and safe and so on, is what is being talked about there.

Continuing on in verse 13, And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace, good will toward men.

Traditional translation there, it actually should be translated more like peace among men of good will. So this again is quite a remarkable story here. These shepherds are out and suddenly this angel appears to them in the middle of the night. And not only that, but a heavenly host of angels appears and starts singing to them and praising God. And from that, we get some of the beautiful music of Hallelujah, of Handel's Messiah there. So then initially the shepherds are petrified and then the angels disappear. And heaven it says here basically just means the sky. They rise up into the sky and disappear. And verse 15, So it was when the angels had gone away from them into heaven, into the sky, that the shepherds said to one another, Let us now go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has come to pass, which the Lord has made known to us. And they came with haste and found Mary and Joseph and the babe lying in a manger. Now when they had seen him, they made widely known the saying which was told them concerning this child. And verse 18, And all those who heard it marveled at those things which were told them by the shepherds, the appearance of the angels in the announcement of the birth of the Messiah. But Mary, and here's an interesting little tidbit that Luke shows in here, the contrast, the shepherds are going around spreading all of this news. And this is another theme we see in the Gospels, a lot of contrast in here. So the shepherds are spreading this word far and wide, but Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart. She's not telling any bad about it. Mary is just probably overwhelmed at what is taking place here.

And the realization that she has indeed given birth to the Messiah, the Savior of Israel, Savior of her people there. And how did Luke know this? Again, this is Luke is writing this about 50 years after these events. All the other firsthand people who were there, firsthand witnesses, are long gone. So the only source Luke could have gone to for this information is Mary herself. To get all of these little details that, again, Luke includes, but none of the other Gospel writers do. As we talked about in the background, Luke is one who includes a lot of stories about women, about children, about the underprivileged, and so on, as we'll see going through these classes here. And this is part of what he includes and the other Gospel writers don't. In verse 20, then the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen as it was told them. So a few thoughts in conclusion here, observations. What does this tell us about God the Father and our Savior, some of the things we've read about here today? One of the study questions I asked was, in what way or ways do the circumstances of Christ's birth parallel those of His death? Food for thought. There's not one answer, but one answer I came up with. I'd like to share with you. First of all, how did Jesus die? He died in the most humiliating way possible at that time, as a common criminal, as a rebel against Rome.

As a criminal, He was mocked, He was beaten, He was ridiculed, He was lied about.

He died in the most shameful way possible for a human to die at that age. What about the circumstances of His birth? Earlier I showed this depiction of Herod's fortress palace at the Herodium near Bethlehem. And it's interesting because almost in the shadow of the Herodium is the town of Bethlehem.

Rulers and kings are born in palaces like this, not in a room where the animals are kept. In a house, not even your own parents' house, in a house that somebody's been generous enough to let you stay there for a while, a few weeks probably there, probably the home of a relative there.

Not even in the living room, not even in the tiny guest room, but in the room where the animals are kept overnight. You might say that Jesus' life is bookended by shame. He dies in shame. He's born in shameful circumstances, embarrassing circumstances.

What are people saying about Jesus? That He's illegitimate. I started to use the words there because they're children here. He's illegitimate. His mother is an adulterer. Probably His father as well. He's the B-word, and that dogs Him through His life. You find reference to it in the Gospels later on. His ministry is bookended by shame.

What did He do during His ministry? He lifted up people who are in shameful circumstances.

The lepers, whom people think are lepers because God is displeased with them. God is cursing them. God is punishing them. The woman with the issue of blood, who is unclean. They're tax collectors. Tax collectors were considered unclean because they are collaborators with the hated Romans. They're the Gentiles who run the country. They're the men with the withered hand. Why is He unclean? Because His right hand is withered. In that culture, your right hand is what you eat with. Your left hand is what you took care of your bodily functions with.

And because this man's right hand is withered and unusable, He has to eat with His left hand, which is a horrendously unclean thing to do in that society and culture to this day.

So Jesus, during His ministry, is actively lifting up those who are in shameful circumstances there. So one of the things we can learn from all of this is we have a Savior who lifts people out of shame and reconciles them to the Father. He's been there. He's experienced that shame. He's experienced that shame. What about those, we talked about the shepherds briefly, whom God chose to reveal the birth of His Son to? Again, God didn't tell the nobility, didn't tell the priest, didn't tell Herod the royalty and all of that. He chose a group of people who were considered unclean and called them to share the good news of the birth of the Son of God.

What does that remind us of our calling here? In 1 Corinthians 1, 26 through 29, where you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many naive, mighty, not many noble are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty, and the base things of the world and the things which are despised. God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are, that no flesh should glory in His presence. So, in other words, we can draw from this, it's not about us. It's not about us. It's about God, and about what God can do through us when we surrender our lives to Him and let Him work within and through us. A few other points I'll cover very quickly here. God is willing to do whatever it takes, including sending His only Son. Philippians 2 talks about the glory that Jesus Christ had and didn't consider it something to be held onto. But He surrendered that divinity and came to earth in the most humble circumstances so that God could restore a relationship with all of mankind, with His children. Another one here, God is surprising and unpredictable in how He chooses to carry out His purpose and plan.

You know, you think back about this story that we just talked about here, the highly unusual circumstance. You know, God had prophesied to Adam and Eve 4,000 years earlier that He's going to send somebody who will restore the right relationship between mankind and the Creator. In 4,000 years if you tried every possible imagination, you would have never come up with a story like this. So God is unpredictable in how He chooses to carry out His plan. Of course, that's something we see in our lives as well. We expect God to do things one way. Does He ever do it that way? Not often that I've seen. Yes, Paul. That points out to make sure that you never knew what God had done. He's the one that He did for the man. And maybe that also means that Christ brought peace between God and man. And He built peace, obviously, between men, and then He was the one that He had done. Right. Right. Right. The truth. Right. Right. Yeah, good point. The other part will come later. In the millennium, it's not going to come in this life. But, very important point, yes, that's a whole part of this story. God did everything, whatever it takes, to restore a relationship with His children there. And He did it by sending His own Son as an offering and as a sacrifice under the most humble of shameful circumstances, though it might be reconciled to Him. Another point here, well, Scripture reference for this last one, Isaiah 55, 8, and 9, for my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the Eternal.

For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. Again, God doesn't work the way we expect things to work out so many times.

Some other points being in God's plan doesn't make for an easy life. The story of Mary. Mary is an unwed mother. What can happen to an unwed mother in that culture? She can be stoned to death. Die a brutal death. I'm sure God prevented that from happening there. Well, for one thing, Joseph would have had to have brought a formal accusation against her. There would have needed to be witnesses, which there weren't. But again, that was part of the danger. It was part of the shame she lived with the rest of her life, being the mother of an illegitimate child. There are people accused of her being. So it doesn't make for an easy life being used by God.

Being a follower, a disciple of Jesus Christ, isn't about self. It's about self-sacrifice. And that was the life of Mary and Joseph. They went through and had to give up a great deal to be used by God in the way they were. It was not any bed of roses, by any means. I'm sure God took care of them, but they had a rough life. We'll cover this next time. What do they have to do? What's the next part of the story? They have to flee to Egypt to keep Herod from murdering your son.

They have to flee the country. Get out of there, because their lives and Jesus' life is in danger.

Another one, the self-righteous, define those God values as unworthy. Talking about the shepherds.

Don't make the same mistake. We don't necessarily know who God is working with all the time.

If we attach labels on others, don't do that. It's a powerful lesson to hear about that.

Another one, God's plan is centered in the person and the power of Jesus Christ.

Something very obvious from the Holy Days, that we just went through the Holy Days coming up and the Holy Days in the fall, too. Jesus Christ is central to every one of those, and He's central to the plan of God. Last but not least, the real story of Jesus Christ's birth is far greater than the counterfeit, foisted off on the world here. It's a much deeper story, a much more meaningful story when we understand the background of it. It's a story that tells us more about the Father and Jesus Christ, our Savior. That's the end of today's study. We'll look forward to picking up later. Unfortunately, I don't have time for questions right now, because I've got to get down to Colorado Springs.

Did want to make one announcement, too. A friend reminded me of this. If any of you are planning to go up to Frisco next week, services will not be at the library, but will be at their house.

You can contact them about getting directions up there. So, with that, the Bible study is dismissed.