The Shepherd, December 2006
GOOD TIDINGS OF GREAT JOY, 4
One who did make full use of all the shepherds had to tell was the Virgin Mother herself. “Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart.” She is pictured in the Gospels as a reticent and thoughtful woman, storing up carefully in her memory everything concerning her Child. She pondered, that is, thought often and deeply about the precious treasures laid up in her heart, - the Annunciation, the visit to her kinswoman, the Righteous Elizabeth, what happened with Joseph, the Birth in Bethlehem, and now the visit of the shepherds - weighing up and musing on what they might all mean concerning the nature and mission of her Son.
Like Peter, James and John, who were not permitted to stay on the mount of Transfiguration, but had to descend into the valley again, so the shepherds could not stay by the manger, but had to return to their flock and their everyday tasks and duties, though they must have returned men who were changed for ever. They would never forget the night when they were called from minding their sheep to be witnesses of the fulfilment of the prophecies concerning the coming of the Messiah, Who would be both the “Glory of Israel” and the “Light to lighten the Gentiles” (Luke 2:32). They had received the Good Tidings from an Angel, they had seen for themselves the Anointed One who was also the Lord, newly born in circumstances of deepest humiliation. In awe and trembling they had been shown the lowly, earthly side balanced by heavenly glory, the humble birth attended by choirs of Angels. This incomprehensible union of opposites, of heavenly and earthly things, is clearly set forth in the inspired Christmas hymns of the Orthodox Church, perhaps above all in the incomparable contakion by St Romanus Melodus:-
TODAY the Virgin giveth birth
to Him Who is transcendent in essence;
and the earth offereth a cave
to Him Who is unapproachable.
Angels with shepherds give glory;
with a star, the Magi do journey;
for our sake a young Child is born,
Who is pre-eternal God.
The shepherds had been the first to proclaim the Incarnate Lord to others. We do not know whether any of them lived long enough to hear St John the Baptist call Him the Lamb of God, or to hear Christ’s own words describing Himself as the Good Shepherd, and the Door of the sheepfold, or to learn the Parable of the Lost Sheep. In view of the unique privilege granted to them as witnesses of the “Nativity according to the flesh of our Lord and God and Saviour Jesus Christ,” it is supremely fitting that the last we hear of the shepherds is that they “returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen, as it was told unto them.”
Kyria Miriam Lambouras of Broadstairs 
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