Follow The Sign

And this [shall be] a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

So you could say ends the soliloquy of the angel of the Lord. Restating what happened according to Luke chapter two verse seven here in verse twelve (and further indicating the angel is likely referring to a past rather than ongoing event) to the shepherds in the field, not only will the shepherds now know what to look for but also they will have some distinguishing characteristics. Not by physical appearance, no -- anyone who has given birth or visited a newborn baby knows babies tend to look alike, even if they do not act alike; besides, babies were two thousand years ago and are now born quite a lot -- but I would imagine babies born and laid in mangers (a manger is a feed trough for barnyard animals) were not a common occurrence.

So it is not as though the shepherds would have to go -- oh make no mistake, they are the ones who had to make the effort to go see Him -- searching in every Bethlehem nook and cranny and asking parents if Christ the Lord is THEIR newborn. (Can you imagine the answers Jewish and Gentile parents alike would be giving dirty, hardscrabble, people they know provide a vital service for clothes and sacrifice and food but they really look down their noses at, provided they did not just call the local authorities on them outright?) And they could not go by appearance, but the angel of the Lord gave them what to look for. Swaddling clothes as we have said before would be essential for all newborns. Then there is the fact this birth was announced by an angel of the Lord.

Angels certainly do not deliver birth announcements on a routine basis, though certainly such divine and divinely-inspired announcements given through those who serve the Lord are not unprecedented in Scripture. Consider the three divine visitors promising Sarah a son in Genesis 18 for the former, the prophet Elisha promising a son to the Shunammite woman in 2 Kings 4 for the latter -- oh, and the angel Gabriel announcing to Mary she would give birth to Jesus in Luke 1, do not forget that! But as we will see continuing to read the account we know from Christmas services worldwide as the Nativity, soon this will go ... explosive!