Approach the crib on Christmas like the shepherds
In St. Luke’s Gospel, the birth of Jesus is followed immediately by a visit from several nearby shepherds. They are the first individuals outside of the Holy Family to see the newborn Jesus.
This is significant, as Jesus did not reveal himself first to the Magi, but instead to the humble shepherds.
Pope Benedict XVI reflected on this reality in a homily on Christmas in 2006:
We have just heard in the Gospel the message given by the angels to the shepherds during that Holy Night, a message which the Church now proclaims to us: “To you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger” (Lk 2:11-12). Nothing miraculous, nothing extraordinary, nothing magnificent is given to the shepherds as a sign. All they will see is a child wrapped in swaddling clothes, one who, like all children, needs a mother’s care; a child born in a stable, who therefore lies not in a cradle but in a manger. God ’s sign is the baby in need of help and in poverty.
Jesus could have revealed himself in great glory, as a king over all the world.
Instead, he came as a baby, defenseless, and revealed himself to shepherds, then considered among the lowest of society.
God’s simplicity
Benedict XVI continues reflecting on this fact, stressing the simplicity of God:
God’s sign is simplicity. God’s sign is the baby. God’s sign is that he makes himself small for us. This is how he reigns. He does not come with power and outward splendour. He comes as a baby – defenceless and in need of our help. He does not want to overwhelm us with his strength. He takes away our fear of his greatness. He asks for our love: so he makes himself a child. He wants nothing other from us than our love, through which we spontaneously learn to enter into his feelings, his thoughts and his will – we learn to live with him and to practise with him that humility of renunciation that belongs to the very essence of love. God made himself small so that we could understand him, welcome him, and love him.
When we approach Jesus on Christmas, we should keep this in mind and approach him as the shepherds did on that cold night.
