I would have wanted to be on the hillside with the shepherds because I would have wanted to see what the angel looked like and what that great company of heavenly hosts looked and sounded like. Was it a spectacular array of winged heavenly beings filling the sky or was it, perhaps, just a group of men – similar to the shepherds – who walked over the hill and told this lowly band about the birth of the Savior? Remember, angels in the Old Testament weren’t necessarily heavenly creatures with wings and halos and radiant light shining around them – they were simply men who came bringing a message from God. So could the angel who came to visit the shepherds have just been a man, or a group of men, who approached them on the hillsides with the good news that the long awaited savior had been born?
The only problem with that scenario is that unlike the angels of the Old Testament, this angel shines with the glory of God, but it’s not just the glory of the Lord that appears, when this angel gives his message to the shepherds, the news is so great that all the hosts of heaven suddenly appear and break into some kind of song of praise. And then as quickly as they all appeared, notice what happens, they all disappear. The Christmas angels – all of them - return to heaven and they are never seen or heard from again.
So the Christmas Angels share with the shepherds the news that a Savior has been born, but then they return to heaven and as far as we know never share that news with anyone else. I wonder why? I wonder why the angels didn’t continue to share the news on other hillsides and throughout the village of Bethlehem or the nearby city of Jerusalem. Why did they stop with this group of shepherds? Maybe it was because the angels knew that this group of shepherds would spread the word about Jesus themselves so they knew that their job was done. Well, that is exactly what happened. After the shepherds received the message of the angels it says they hurried off to find the child, and once they find Jesus in a Bethlehem stable, lying in a manger, they know that the Angel’s message is true and that the Messiah has come and the first thing they do is begin to share this good news with others. In fact Luke wants to make sure we get that detail so he mentions it twice. Luke 2:17 & 20.
So the Christmas angels return to heaven because they know that a group of shepherds would now become the after-Christmas angels. You see angels are simply messengers of God’s word and God’s truth, so when the shepherds see Jesus for themselves and begin to share the message that the Savior of the world has been born , they in effect become angels – or messengers - themselves. And every person who has shared this message of Jesus, that he is Christ the Lord becomes an after-Christmas angel and today God still needs after-Christmas angels to spread the news and share the love of Christ in all the world.
All of us are here today because of an After-Christmas Angel. There has been someone in our lives who shared with us the truth that God loved us so much that he sent Jesus to save us from sin and death. There has been some angel who shined forth the light and love of God and helped change our lives and bring us life. Who was that angel for you? Who was the one who told you about Jesus and shared with you the love of God? My after-Christmas Angel was Dave DeGraaf. Dave was a friend of mine at Michigan State who didn’t just tell me about Jesus but shared with me the love and joy of Jesus and he just radiated out the grace and power of God.
Today Dave is still an After-Christmas Angel because he works to translate the Bible into the native languages of Africa, so he literally continues to share God’s message of good news and great joy with people who have never heard of Jesus and that message is changing their lives – he is still an angel, but we don’t have to be a bible translator or missionary to be an angel, God wants us to be After-Christmas angels right where we are and we learn how to be that kind of an angel by simply following the example of the Christmas angels.
We’ve already seen that the Christmas angels were different from other angels we read about because they seem to be surrounded by the radiance and glory of God. There is some kind of light or power that literally shines forth from these messengers; it’s so real and visible that it catches the attention of the shepherds – they are filled with fear. Now as After-Christmas Angels we will not shine with a physical light, but our lives can reflected the presence and the light of God. Do people see in us the joy and peace and power of God? Do people look at us and listen to us and say, Wow, there is something different about that person? Do people see God’s light and glory in us and through us?
As I have been thinking about the people I know who do radiate out the light of God I realized that none of them work at it – the glory and presence of God just flows from their hearts and lives and the reason it does is because their hearts and lives are fully surrendered to Jesus. Like the angels and then the shepherds who become angels, they simply can’t help but share God’s good news of great joy because it has touched their own hearts and lives and they can’t help but share the love of God because that love has changed them.
If we want to be the kind of angel that shines God’s light into the darkness of our world then we don’t work on being the light – we work on reflecting God’s light and we do this by just surrendering our hearts to God every day and I am convinced that this needs to be an every day process. The darkness of our world is strong and whether it is the bad news we see around us or the depression and despair that tries to settle deep within us, the darkness of the world seeks to steal our joy and peace and so every day we need to ask Jesus to enter our hearts and lives and fill us up. We need to be filled with a light that simply won’t go out.
Like the Christmas Angels, we don’t just shine forth God’s light, we also have to speak God’s message. The Christmas angels told the shepherds the good news of great joy that was told to them – that a Savior had been born. The Shepherds simply told the world the good news of great that was told to them and that they had seen with their own eyes that a savior had been born. Today we are simply to share that same message, a savior has been given to the world, has been given to us, and it is Jesus Christ. It’s important for us to be able to speak the truth about God’s word which means that it is important for us to know God’s word, so I hope that you will make a commitment in the coming year to continue to study the word of God so that together we can share that word with others. Again, I’m amazed that the Christmas angels told just one group of people and then went back into heaven, God had faith in those shepherds to spread the word and you know God’s plan hasn’t changed, he isn’t sending heavenly beings to share his message with the world today because his plan is to use us and God still has faith in us as after-Christmas angels.
The last thing that I think we After-Christmas angels need to do today is something not seen in the Christmas Angels and that is to share God’s love in real and personal ways. The Christmas Angels return to heaven so quickly that they don’t spend any time building relationships with the shepherds so that they can really share God’s love, but as After-Christmas angels we have that opportunity. We have the opportunity to not just speak God’s word but to share God’s love in very real ways with one another. Dave DeGraaf didn’t just teach me about Jesus, he became a friend who shared with me the love and grace and power of God. He walked with me during difficult times, patiently answered all my questions about life and faith and personally cared about me and my life and I think that is part of what God wants from us today. We have an opportunity the Christmas Angels didn’t have, we get to build relationships with others and through those relationships we get to share the love of God. We get to offer people grace and mercy, we get the privilege of telling people that they are forgiven and loved by God and then share that forgiveness and love as we walk through life with them. What an honor and what a joy we have in being After-Christmas angels.
So on this Christmas Day as we hear the Christmas Angels, their great glad tidings tell, let’s become those angels who will tell the world that God loves us all so much that he came to in the person of Jesus to be our Savior. Today let’s be those After-Christmas Angels who will go forth and shine God’s light, speak God’s word and share deeply God’s love.
