And this shall be the sign to you.—It happens here, as in the annunciation of the birth to Mary (ch. 1:36). A sign was vouchsafed, where none was asked,—God seeing that it was indispensably necessary, on account of the extraordinary nature of the circumstance; while Zachariah, who requested a sign, was visited with loss of speech. The sign now granted, is as wonderful as the occurrence just announced, yet one suited to the capacity of the shepherds, and at the same time infallible. The fear, as to whether they may approach the new-born King, and offer Him their homage, is dispelled by the intimation of His lowly condition, while their carnal views of the nature of His kingdom are thereby counteracted. Unless we suppose that the shepherds forthwith made inquiry in all the possible φάτναι (manger) of Galilee, whether a child had lately been born therein, we must conclude that their own well-known, and perhaps not far distant φάτνη (manger), was the one pointed out. If they would naturally have hastened thither first, we are not left to suppose, with Olshausen, that they were led by some secret influence upon their minds. Conjectures, which give offence to the skeptical, are best avoided, when not indispensably necessary.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. This narrative may be called, The history of the first preaching of the gospel upon earth. It became Him, of whom are all things, and by whom are all things, to send such a message by the mouth of an angel. The last preaching of the gospel, the glad tidings of the last day, “Behold, He cometh again,” will also be announced with the voice of the archangel, and the trump of God.
2. It will not seem without significance, to any who appreciate the symbolic element of the Scriptures, that the first announcement was made to shepherds. Jehovah had Himself borne the name of the shepherd of Israel, and the Messiah had been announced under this designation by the prophets (Ps. 23; Ezek. 34). David had pastured his flocks in this very neighborhood; and since the rich and mighty in Jerusalem were looking only for an earthly deliverer, it was undoubtedly among these humble shepherds that the poor in spirit and the mourners would be found, to whom the Lord Himself afterwards addressed His own preaching. There is something indescribably divine and touching in the care of God to satisfy the secret yearnings of individuals, at the same time when He is occupying Himself with the eternal salvation of millions. Man overlooks the masses in the individual, or neglects the individual in the masses; God equally comprehends the interests of both in His arrangements.
3. The glory of the Lord, which shone round the shepherds, consisted not alone in the dazzling brightness of the angel, but was manifested by the fact of his appearing, at such a moment, in such a place, to such men. An angel announces the birth of Jesus; no such announcement distinguishes the birth of John; and thus it is made evident from the very first, how much the King surpasses the forerunner. But for this angelic manifestation, how could the glad tidings have been communicated with infallible certainty, and who could have been more worthy of so august a proclamation than the Word made flesh? Yet the angel appears not in the manger, but visits the shepherds in the silent night-watches, in the open field; a circumstance which powerfully testifies, that the greatness which is to distinguish the Lord’s coming is a silent and hidden greatness. He appears to shepherds: God has chosen the mean things of the world to confound the things which are mighty. He speaks too in a manner suited to their comprehension and to their need, and impresses on the first preaching of the gospel that character indelebilis of all its after-announcements: “Great joy.” Surely we can hardly fail to perceive here also, somewhat of the πολυποικιλος σοφία τοῦ Θεοῦ, spoken of in Eph. 3:10.
4. The Redeemer is here called Saviour, not Jesus. This name was first to be bestowed upon Him eight days later, in the rite of circumcision.—Born unto you: the word must have directed the attention of the shepherds to the fact, that a supply for the felt necessity of each individual soul was now provided. The sign granted to them is so peculiarly an exercise of their faith, that we might almost imagine we heard the new-born Saviour exclaim to those who were the first to come unto Him: “Blessed is he whosoever shall not be offended in Me.”
[5. From Dr. RICHARD CLERKE (abridged): God has in every birth His admirable work. But God to be a child, Θεὸς ἐγγάστριος, God in a woman’s womb, that is the miraculum miraculorum. The great God to be a little babe (μέγας Θεὸς μικρὸν βρέφος, St. Basil); the Ancient of days to become an infant (co-infantiari, St. Irenæus); the King of eternity to be two or three months old (βασιλεὺς αἰώνων to be bimestris, trimestris), the Almighty Jehovah to be a weak man; God immeasurably great, whom heaven and earth cannot contain, to be a babe a span long; He that rules the stars to suck a woman’s nipple (regens sidera—sugens ubera, Augustine); the founder of the heavens rocked in a cradle; the swayer of the world swathed in infant bands;—it is ἔργον ἀπιστότατον, a Greek father says, a most incredible thing. The earth wondered, at Christ’s Nativity, to see a new star in heaven; but heaven might rather wonder to see a new Sun on earth.—P. S.]
Lange, J. P., & van Oosterzee, J. J. (2008). A commentary on the Holy Scriptures: Luke (P. Schaff & C. C. Starbuck, Trans.; pp. 36–37). Logos Bible Software. (Public Domain)
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