Luke 2:18-20

CHRISTMAS THOUGHTS AND FEELINGS

‘And all they that heard it wondered.… But Mary kept all these things, and pondered them in her heart. And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God.’

Luke 2:18

These three verses may suggest to us in what spirit we ought to look back to the birth of Christ.

I. Wonder.—‘All they that heard it wondered.’ It was a strange tale to which they listened. And our wonder may be deeper still; for we know more clearly than they did Who Jesus was. To them this Babe was ‘Christ, the Saviour’; to us this Christ is the Incarnate Son of God. And who can fathom this mysterious union of the Divine and human natures in the Bethlehem Child?

II. Thoughtful pondering.—‘Mary kept all these things, and pondered them in her heart’; and we may be sure that this pondering would bear its good fruits in the developing and maturing of her own spiritual character. Such pondering becomes us also, as we look back to the birth of Jesus. The celebration of Christmas is apt to degenerate into a thing of mere sentiment. Ponder, then, the meaning and purpose of the Incarnation, and its relation to your own spiritual needs, so that you may be led into faith which has made its basis, not in mere sentiment, but in earnest conviction. We all need such a faith.

III. Joyful praise.—‘The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God.’ And these same feelings of gladness and gratitude ought to fill our hearts also, as we think of what Christ has done for our own souls and for human society.

Illustration

‘ “The real and fundamental difficulty in regard of the Lord’s virgin birth is,” says Bishop Ellicott, “that it involved a miracle—something unprecedented in the whole history of the human race, something that every birth into the world showed plainly to be contradictory to all experience. If this be the real basis of the denial of the virgin birth, how much more emphatic must be a denial of all that the Evangelist tells us immediately followed it—the appearance of an angel from heaven telling humble shepherds, as they were watching over their flocks, that there was born that night in the neighbouring village of Bethlehem a Saviour, the long-promised Messiah and Lord; and furthermore, that the holy message will be verified to them, and to all who might inquire of them, by an unwonted sign, a babe lying in a manger. We cannot wonder, then, that the second chapter of Luke’s Gospel is regarded by most of those who deny the virgin birth of our Lord fully as doubtful and unhistorical as the first chapter. But on this point it is not necessary for us to dwell, as it is enough for us that the early Church did plainly accept the narratives in the first two Chapter s of Matthew and Luke as authentic and true, and that no doubt as to their canonical authority has ever been entertained in the Church.” ’