Why Aren't You Marveling?

And all those who heard it

marveled at those things
 which were told them

by the shepherds.

Luke 2:18, NKJV

Who do you think they told?  I don't know if you've ever asked yourself that question, ever even thought about it.  But between now when they had seen Him, they made widely known and the shepherds returned there's this verse about people marveling.  And I'm sitting here wondering, who did they tell?

Certainly they told their families, perhaps rousing their wives and children from their beds to tell the wonderful story.  An angel visited us tonight, right there on the hillside with all the sheep, and told us that the Messiah was being born right here in Bethlehem!  Can you believe it?  And then there was this angel choir that filled the sky with song.  And when we went to find the baby the angel told us about, we found him!  Isn't that great?

Maybe they even woke the neighbors, rousting them from their beds with the glad tidings of treat joy.  Hey, the Savior has been born tonight!  Perhaps they ran through the quiet country village shouting the good news.  Lamps were lit, sashes thrown back, people leaned out of windows and peeked out of doors to see what all the commotion was about.  And every face the shepherds spotted brought them to a breathless halt as they cried, The Savior of the World has been born tonight!

And those who heard it marveled.

Now marvel is not a word used in our every day language.  Neither is wonder, at least not in the sense the KJV employs for this verse.  But I'm thinking the response was more than just "Wow, cool."  If you belonged to a people whose entire religion and cultural identity was wrapped up in the promise of a savior, what would your response be to the announcement of his arrival?

The savior.  The great deliverer.  The anointed one.  The prophet greater than Moses.  The redeemer.  The seed of the woman.  The seed of Abraham.  The Son of David.  The Son of Man.  The triumphant king.  The Lord Himself.  The Son of God. 

Yeah, that guy!  That's who just got born!

Perhaps if we used the words as descriptors.  It was marvelous news, wonderful news, glorious news!  These people hadn't even had a real word from God in 400 years.  They had heroes like the Maccabees, but no one who had really spoken from God in 15 generations.  And along come the shepherds.

Perhaps they laughed.  Or shouted.  Or wept.  Or danced.  Or fell on their faces to worship the Lord.  Perhaps they went seeking this babe the shepherds spoke of.  But outside our imaginations, there is no way of knowing how they responded, except that the Bible says they marveled at what they heard.

And now here's the hardest question of all.

Why don't people marvel today?  When we tell them about Jesus, why don't they see it as wonderful news?

I've got some ideas about that, too.  First of all, so many in our cultural don't accept their own need for a savior.  So when you tell them the savior of the world has come/is coming, they shrug and say, So What.  They're not waiting for someone to rescue them from their problems, to forgive them of their sins, to redeem them from destruction.  They have no anticipation of the Messiah.

Secondly, when we present the good news, are we giving the world facts that are 2000 years old, or are we giving them the up-to-date facts about what Jesus is doing today, right now?  Because everything Jesus did in the Bible for those Jewish people twenty centuries ago, he still does today!  Are you sick, hurting, lonely, desperate, needy, lost, bewildered, searching, questioning, longing?  My friend, I've got good news for you.

Finally, are we excited about what Jesus has done for us?  We who are saved are walking miracles, living testaments to what Jesus does.  We have the best news ever.  Maybe the world isn't excited about hearing it, because we're not excited about having it. 

Just a thought.