Message by Larry Thacker Jr. for December 18: What Will You Do with the Message?
God chose humble shepherds, some of the lowest people of that society, to share the message that the savior had come. Now admittedly, the presentation was hard to deny. Not everyone gets serenaded by a choir of angels when God speaks to them. But these shepherds still had a choice to make. They could have decided that since no one would ever believe what they had just seen, they would just keep quiet about it. People already looked down on them, They might just think the shepherds did a little to much partying the night before. But that’s not what they did. They believed the message. They went to see for themselves that what they were told was true. Then they went out and told everyone what they had seen. This is the example for us.
That message is still as wonderful today as it was then, but sometimes it gets lost. Whether it’s drowned out by all the trappings of the holiday, or suppressed by fear of those who are hostile to it, or tainted by those of us who find fault with the timing and method of the celebrations, the effect is the same. We need to be more like those shepherds. We need to proclaim far and wide the wonder of what we have seen. Our scripture focus will be Luke 2:8-20.
