We'll open your Bibles back up to the Gospel of Luke. The Gospel of Luke in that chapter 2 that we just read from a few moments ago. Every year at this time, or at least at the two major Christian holidays, Christmas and Easter, our weekly news magazines, Time, U.S. News and World Report, and Newsweek, always come out with stories or specials that are written about those two events, those two Christian events, Christmas, the incarnation of Jesus Christ, and then Easter, the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And this year is not an exception. The only good news is that U.S. News and World Report is no longer in print. It's only electronically available. And at the end of this year, the same way will be true for Newsweek magazine. But one of their very last issues in Newsweek magazine is about Christmas. And it's kind of like Newsweek versus the New Testament when you really get down to the bottom line. In Newsweek magazine for this week, the cover of this particular issue is titled, Who Was Jesus? It's written by a liberal professor, a liberal seminarian. His name is Bart Ehrman. And his article that's in Newsweek was originally titled, until it became on the Newsweek magazine, it was originally titled, The Myths About Jesus. Jesus never existed, is what he maintains. This article unfolds that it's all a fictitious story. and that we can't put any confidence or reliance in the Bible or the story that the Bible tells us about Jesus' coming. And they do this every year, Christmas and Easter, U.S. News & World Report, Time magazine, and Newsweek. But I'm here to tell you, as I think all of us here today already know, that the birth, life, and death of Jesus Christ is the single most provable fact in history. Josh McDowell, who has spoken to more college students, millions of college students, has spoken to more college students than anyone in the history of the world, and has written several books. He's an apologist. Apologies to someone who defends the Scriptures or defends the faith using both external means as well as the Word of God itself. So Josh McDowell has written several books. One of them, Evidence Demands a Verdict, The Case for Christ, I think he didn't write that one, but he wrote another one similar to that title. But he validates that the single most, more, more facts are assessed and provable and reliable that Jesus Christ lived, died and was resurrected than the fact that George Washington was the first president of the United States. It is the single most provable fact in all of history. So when we look at Luke chapter two, It's more than just a fact. It's God's unfolding revelation about the Incarnation. And why is the Incarnation? Why is Christmas celebrated? Now, we don't know the day of when Jesus was born. We don't know that it was December 25th. We don't know that. But we celebrate Christmas, or literally, we celebrate the Incarnation because without the Incarnation, we couldn't have redemption. Jesus Christ had to come as a man He had to robe Himself in flesh. He had to experience what you and I experience, but all without sin. That's why He was born of a virgin. So the sin nature that you and I struggle with every day of our life would not be passed on to Him. came into this world, ultimately, yes, to teach us some great things, ultimately to show us how to live, but most importantly, to die on the cross for our sins. And we want to look at Luke 2, the heavenly announcement of Jesus' birth. And Pastor Hamilton read to us the first 20 verses of this chapter, but we're going to narrow it down to verses 8-14. particularly looking at the angelic hosts that came and announced to the shepherds that the Savior had come into the world. This pinnacle of history. All of history prior to that time, the 4,000 or 5,000 years before that time, we're pointing to this event. All of our history these last 2,000 years are pointing back to that event. It is the summit. It is the apex of all of history because God rent the veil and stepped into time. He who has no marking of time. Time has no bearing on God. He's from eternity past. Eternity, future. Time has no bearing on God, but He rent the veil, stepped into our world that He had created. And He stepped into time. And we see that event right here in Luke 2. By the way, throughout history, mankind has looked for deliverers. Mankind has looked for leaders and saviors that would lift them from their troubles. That's still true today. It will be true in the future. And it was certainly true. It was a prevalent desire and feeling amongst the Jews and literally of all the world at that time. The Bible says that in the fullness of time, at the perfect point in time, the corruption of the Jewish religion had become legalistic and it was frustrating to the Jewish people. At the zenith of the Greek language, the greatest language that's ever been used by mankind, the most descriptive way of expressing thought and idea is the Greek language. the Roman culture that had mapped out the world and connected it with its roads and had brought all these warring, petty nations together under the empire. At the zenith of time, God stepped into our world. So this longing for a Savior, this longing for a Deliverer was very prevalent at the time of Jesus' birth. The Romans actually The Romans actually gave Caesar Augustus the title, Savior of the World. And while Caesar Augustus was in Rome basking in that prestigious title, the real Savior of the World was born in an obscure little village in one of the many nations that had been conquered by the Roman military machine. That's where the real Savior of the World born and brought into. The wonderful news of the Savior came via supernatural means. Angels on a cold, wintry night on the Judean hillsides as they kept their sheep. And I'm sure the shepherds who slept out under the stars had gotten their sheep into the pen or into the cave And they told their stories and they sat by their campfire and they played their flutes or harps until it was time for all of them to fall off to sleep. And they were suddenly awakened. And they may not have seen Him. Maybe that's why those in Bethlehem and four or five miles away, those in Jerusalem, didn't see this heavenly host that appeared because the shepherds were out underneath the stars. The shepherds were out underneath the heavens. Everybody else was tucked away in their homes, but the shepherds could see all that was happening in the sky. And they were suddenly awakened by this myriad number Some commentators, because John later in the book of Revelation talks about 10,000 times 10,000 angels. We don't know how many angels there are. We do know that a third of them followed Lucifer in his rebellion against God. But we know that there are probably hundreds of millions of angels. We don't know how many appeared in the sky. At least 10,000, but some would even estimate maybe a million angels appeared from heaven to earth. And they appeared in the sky to make this proclamation to the shepherds. Let's look at this story a little bit more closely. Look at verses 8 through 10 of chapter 2. Now they were in the same country, shepherds, living out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. Behold, an angel, a single angel at this point, only one, an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them, and they were greatly afraid. And the angel said to them, Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to everybody, to all people, not just the Jews, but to everyone. Notice with me, first of all, the proclamation of the good news in verses 8-10. Now, if Prince William and Kate Middleton have a baby, and they probably will, if they have a baby here in these next number of months, how do you think that royal news is going to get out. It's going to be in the London Telegraph. It's going to be announced publicly. It will spread across the world in a very short period of time. If a PR firm was hired to disseminate the news that a royal birth was taking place, they wouldn't start with the shepherds. They wouldn't start with the shepherds. Maybe in this day they would have went to the Pharisees who were kind of in charge religiously, or maybe to the high priests, or maybe to the Sanhedrin, the official ruling Jewish body, maybe even to the household of King Herod. If a PR firm was hired, they wouldn't have started with the shepherds. But God does. Why is that? Why does God do something that's so unorthodox to us? So different than the way we would do it. God sent His angelic messengers to the shepherds. By the way, shepherds. Oh, we kind of have a picture if you've got a crush in your house as we do. You know, you've got some shepherds there. And it's kind of an idyllic scene, and we think of shepherds pretty fondly. And certainly in Israel, there is a history of shepherds. Abraham, the Bible tells us, was a herdsman, and it included some sheep. So Abraham was a shepherd. Moses spent the second 40 years of his life from age 40 to age 80 after he left Egypt. He went into Midian and he kept sheep for his father-in-law. He had to unlearn all the things he learned in Egypt. So the next 40 years, he was out in the desert keeping sheep. And then the last 40 years, he spent leading the people of Israel. David, of course, was a shepherd before he became the king of Israel. Israel's great king. So Israel had a history of shepherds in their past. And these shepherds were raising sheep that would be for the temple sacrifices that were just a few miles away. So they were bringing up the sheep and providing the sheep that would be used at the temple. But shepherds were on the lowest rung of the social and religious ladder in that day. It was a low skill. I'm not trying to be demeaning here, but it was a low-skilled, menial job. Often children, young people would keep the sheep because sheep basically graze. And all you've got to do is make sure they've got grass or water and then keep any predators away. So often children, young people would take care of the shepherding business. So it was a low-skilled, menial job, low pay. And of course, they were considered ceremonially unclean because they were out there with the animals. dealing with the animals which made them unclean according to the Pharisee. And it kept them away from the temple. It kept them away from the sacrificial system. So they were ceremonial unclean. So they were poor. They were uneducated. They were religiously ostracized, we would say. They were ceremonial unclean. So why does God come to them? Why does God send the angels to the shepherds of all people in that society? Clearly, God chose to use the shepherds in spite of their social and religious status to underscore His love for the lowly and for the outcast. And if you're a believer here today, may you never forget that. If you want to reflect the heart of God in your heart, You should love the lowly and love the outcasts, those that are on the fringes and the peripheral of society, because when Jesus came, His harshest words were for the religious leaders. I'm a religious leader. I hope I wouldn't be in that category. But His harshest words were for the Pharisees and the scribes and the religious leaders that were so into their religion and so into their self and so into controlling people that they missed the Savior when He was right in front of them and doing the miracles and preaching to them. And Jesus came to the religious outcasts and the fringes of society. And that included specifically the shepherds. Jesus Himself is called the Good Shepherd. So this is a wonderful metaphor of God's salvation sovereignly extended to undeserving sinners like you and like me. God chose to extend salvation to the most undeserving segments of society, while those who felt they didn't need it, missed it. Wonderful metaphor. That's why the Apostle Paul said later in 1 Timothy 1, verse 15, he said, Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of whom I am chief. Jesus came into the world to save sinners. People that think they don't need a Savior will miss the Savior. But those who realize how undone, how unprepared for eternity, how unclean spiritually they are, those are the ones that God reveals Himself to. Paul says, I'm the chief of sinners. The lower the sinner, the greater glory God receives in saving them. The lower the sinner, the lower the sinner, the baser the sin, the more glory God seems to receive in saving them. By the way, note the Bible tells us the glory of the Lord accompanied this heavenly host. It says, now they were in the same country, shepherds living out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And behold, the angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them. The glory of the Lord accompanies these heavenly messengers. It wasn't their glory. They're simply angels, which means, by the way, messenger. But it was the Lord's glory that descended with them. that accompanied them in this journey and in this mission that they were on. God's glory is seen several times throughout the Bible. Remember when Moses went up on the Mount Sinai and he was up there for 40 days? He didn't eat or drink. God sustained him and he Absorbed really the glory of God and when he came down the people couldn't even look at Moses because his face Shown so much his body glowed so much it came through his clothes his robe and and they they told him put a veil over your face So we can look at you Moses. So when you talk to us, we can look at you He absorbed the glory of the Lord. Remember when the tabernacle was completed out there in the wilderness and the Shekinah glory, the pillar of fire led them at night and the pillar of Shekinah glory led them by day and it came into the tabernacle And they couldn't go into it. And they were just in awe of the Shekinah glory. The same thing happened when Solomon completed the temple. The Shekinah glory came upon that. They couldn't even enter the temple until it had subsided to some degree. So we see the glory of God. By the way, do you remember when the glory of God departed from Israel? Ezekiel 10 talks about that. It was before the children of Israel went into captivity, before they were being taken into Babylon because of their sins and their rejection of God, that the glory of the Lord left the temple. And Ezekiel writes about it in Ezekiel 10, verses 18 and 19. Really, chapters 8 through 10 are dealing with that whole topic, but those verses there talk about it specifically. And the glory of God ascended up into heaven. Now, realize, The glory of God had been with Israel for since the beginning of the nation leaves at the time of their captivity going into Babylon. And so for 400 years or a little over that, the glory of God has absented itself from Israel. No glory manifest until now. The glory of the Lord returns. And He doesn't return to a building. It doesn't return to a tent. It returns in human flesh in the person of the Messiah. The glory of the Lord descends and it's there in Jesus Christ in the 30 or 30-some years that He's on earth. The glory of the Lord. They looked up and they could hardly look at the angel because the glory of the Lord was there as it had been manifest several times. in Israel's past. They knew that this was a spectacular event in Israel's history unlike anything before. Understandably, the shepherds' reaction was what? What does it say here? That they were struck with fear. They knew what they were. They knew they were sinners. They knew they didn't even frequent the temple. That they were ceremonial and unclean. Understand the shepherd's reaction to these angels. It was one of fear. But the announcement from the angel is, fear not. Just like Gabriel had said to Mary, he said, fear not. He says to shepherds, fear not. They were probably thinking judgment is going to fall. Punishment is going to come upon us. We're not fit to come into the presence of God or even His messenger. And by the way, every time angelic messengers came, whether it be to Samson's parents or Abraham, they fell on their face and the angels said, don't worship me. I'm simply a messenger of God. And they would have them stand. Angels never receive worship. But they were in fear when they saw this glory and heard the angelic messenger. And what does He tell them? What does He tell them here in these verses? He says in verse 10, the angel said to them, Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings. I'm not bringing judgment. I'm not a bearer of bad news or punishment. I bring you good tidings, great joy, which will be for all people. So his was not an announcement of judgment, but of good news. By the way, notice that word good news. It's the Greek word uangalizo. Recognize that? Uangalizo is not a word that's translated into the English. It's transliterated into our Bible, our English Bible. We have the word evangelize. So this word good news is our verb evangelize. He says, I bring you good news. The good news is that God is proclaiming to you that a Savior is born. The angel proclaims the good news that a merciful God who is sending a Savior, has sent a Savior into the world who would die on the cross and forever forgive their sins. Forgive the sins of whoever would put their faith in Him and believe upon Him. That's the good news. That's the evangel messy. And this should bring great joy. He said, I bring you good news that shall bring about in your life great joy. Let me ask you just for a moment. What brings you great joy? Maybe there's someone here that's getting a new car for Christmas. Bring it by. Let me check it out. I love cars. I'm a car person. Maybe you're getting a new car, maybe you got something new for the house, new TV, new couch, new kids, I don't know, whatever. Maybe you're getting something you're really excited about and it's going to bring you or it's bringing you great joy, a piece of jewelry or whatever it is. Maybe it's a big bonus or whatever. It's bringing you great joy. He says this message that Jesus Christ has come into the world shall bring you great joy. There's no other gift, there's no other thing that we could ever receive that could bring the kind of joy that man can be reconciled to God and have eternal life. What could be better news than that? Great joy. I bring you good news that should bring about great joy." So the shepherds went from sheer terror to supreme glee upon hearing this supernatural announcement. So the proclamation of the good news, verses 8-10. Look at the person of the good news, verses 11-12. It says, "...for there is born to you this day in the city of David..." Now, Jerusalem later earlier had been called the City of David because that's where he ruled from. But David was born in Bethlehem. The City of David. A Savior who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign to you. You shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling cloth, lying in a manger. The person of the good news. So first comes the proclamation. And now he says the good news, it's a person. The good news is wrapped up in a person. Christ. They're told, it is Christ the Lord. Christ is a pretty exalted title for a baby born in such humble circumstances. It's the Greek word Christos. Our English word, Christ. He wore no gold crown. There was no halo hovering above His head. There were no outward signs of His deity or His sovereignty. Just a baby tightly wound, tightly wrapped up in little strips of cloth to keep Him warm, to keep His limbs in. We still do that very thing today. It's an adjustment period, transition period from the tightly wound womb that he's been in. So just a baby tightly wound in strips of cloth lying in a feed trough. That's what a manger is. In a feed trough. I grew up on a farm. I've got two brothers who are farming. And we get this picture in our mind. You know, the star is hovering over there. And it was. The shepherds are gathered around, and Joseph and Mary are kneeling before. It's just kind of a warm, glowing, sterile, beautiful scene. And it is. But if you've been on the farm, and I was just back there at Thanksgiving, and my brother, I think I told you, is now milking 370 Holstein, and he's getting ready to bump it up to about 600. And we walked through the barns. He was getting ready to build another barn. He walked through the barns and I was asking him how things have changed. And they don't put silage in the silo anymore. They put it in a bunker and they mix it in with The hailage and the silage are all mixed together. And we walked through the feeding area. My brother has increased the herd. He's a herdmaster. He's increased his Holstein from giving 50 pounds on an average per cow. You measure milk in pounds. 50 pounds. Now they average 90 pounds a day. Each cow averages 90 pounds a day. And he said, I want these cows either eating, sleeping, or being milked. What a life, I'm telling you. What a life. And they're doing it. But we walked through the barns, and he told me about his plan, and there was the haylage and the silage, and it was one long 200 foot manger on each side. You know what? I had no desire to crawl down in that haylage and just take a nap. First of all, I'd probably get bit, you know, or something like that, because all those heads were sticking through the tangent. But it isn't quite, and by the way, out behind the barn, my brother has a cement pond that looks like a lake. And guess what's in that cement pond? The stuff that goes through the animals and comes out the other end. And then it's scraped out into that pond and the honey wagon comes all day long. The hired men are pumping. They have a big pump. They hook it on to the honey wagon and they pump it into there and they spread it on all the surrounding fields. I was saying to my brother, I said, man, what is that smell? He said, that's the smell of money. It didn't smell like money. It smelled like refuse. And so we get this picture of this idyllic scene, but here is Jesus wrapped in these little strips of cloth because His parents were so poor. And they put Him in a manger. They put Him in a little crib that the cows would eat out of, but it really wasn't a crib like we think of. And that's the scene that He comes into. None of the outward signs of sovereignty and of deity and royalty and the things that we would think would accompany the Son of God. That's a pretty lowly birth for the Savior of the world, isn't it? Pretty lowly birth. I mean, there isn't a mother that says, hey, that's where I want my baby born. Forget St. Anthony's. Forget St. Joe's. Anybody got a manger? That's a pretty lowly birth of an exalted Savior, the Christos. Christ meaning anointed One. That's what Christ means. Sometimes we think that's His last name. Jesus' given name and Christ's last name. No, it's a title. And it means the anointed One. It's the Hebrew word Messiah. That's translated Messiah. Anointed One is translated into Hebrew. And into our English language, the the Messiah or the anointed one, that's that's what Christos means in the Greek language. And now, of course, in our English language, he is the anointed one. And Jesus was the anointed. By the way, what did they do in the Old Testament world? What did they do in the ancient world? Not just in Jewish. They anointed their prophets. They anointed their priests. They anointed their kings. When they anointed them, they put oil on their forehead and they were basically setting them apart. You've seen it where we've anointed men in our church who are called to ministry and done their training. We anoint them or we lay hands on them. We're saying we set you apart to do the work of the ministry. And when someone got anointed, a king was anointed, he was being set apart from the rank and file of the average people. Or the priest got anointed, he was being set apart from the other Levites. Or when the prophet got anointed, they were saying, this man, the hand of God is upon him. So, being anointed, the anointed one is saying, God Himself has come. And Jesus, of course, was prophet, priest and king. He is the King of kings. The Bible tells us that someday Jesus will appear in the sky and every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that He is King of kings and that He is Lord of lords. The first time He came as a humble babe and as a suffering Savior, but the next time He comes, He comes as King of kings and Lord of lords to rule. But He's not only King of kings. He's not only anointed king, but he was anointed as the great prophet. He is God's ultimate spokesman. God's ultimate spokesman. The greatest preacher who ever lived. Listen to what Hebrews 1, verse 1 says, God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in times past by the fathers and by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son. whom He has appointed heir to all things." So, He has had prophets in the past, but in these last days, He came and He sent the prophet of prophets. He sent His Son, the greatest of all preachers, the greatest of all the prophets. He sent His Son. He's King of kings. He's Lord of lords. He's the greatest of all the prophets. And He is the great High Priest. Jesus was anointed as our High Priest. I remember after I got saved, I was saved as a college student. I came from a religion that basically taught you have to go through a priest, an emissary, a mediator to get to God. And I remember reading this verse and understanding 1 Timothy 2, verse 5, it says, for there is one God. Not a bunch of gods. There is one God. And then it goes on to say, and there is one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. First Timothy 2.5. So there's only one God, and God Himself is the mediator. He is the go-between. As a matter of fact, in Job, the Hebrew word is translated, there is one umpire. There is one goal between God and man. The man Christ Jesus. We don't need anybody else. Jesus Christ did the job for us in offering up Himself, not another sacrifice, but Himself as the High Priest. He is the Mediator. He is the High Priest. And the only one that we need. The veil of the temple was torn and rent. Saying to us, all men have access to God now. Jesus alone through His atoning death can take sinners into the presence of a holy God. Something we never had access to in the past. Before the foundation of the world, before God ever created man, He knew that we would fall. And so in His wonderful plan, in His sovereign plan, Jesus became the appointed ruler, the compassionate intercessor, and the great spokesman, prophet, priest, and king. That's why He was anointed. That's why He's given the title Messiah, Christos, Christ, the Anointed One. He is God's Anointed One. So, there's the proclamation of the good news. There is the person of the good news. Third and finally, the purpose of the good news. Look at verses 13 and 14. What is the purpose? The Bible tells us in this passage. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude. And the word multitude is the Greek word that is loosely translated 10,000. It could be 10,000 times 10,000 as it's used later in the book of Revelation. And suddenly there was with the angel thousands, tens of thousands of heavenly hosts praising God and saying, glory to God in the highest and on earth peace, goodwill towards all men. These well-known verses describe the highest, the most sublime response to the truth that can occur in the universe. It's praise to God. When we understand the truth, our response ought to be praise to God. The angels glorify God, which is the ultimate purpose of the Gospel. You might be saying, well, wait a minute, Pastor, I think you slipped up there. Isn't the purpose of the Gospel to save people? Yes. But the end of the Gospel is to bring about worship. As it's been said so well many times in the past, evangelism or missions exist because worship does not. We evangelize. We take the message of the gospel to the ends of the world because not everybody is worshiping the one true God. So evangelism or missions exist because worship doesn't in some places. As a matter of fact, in a lot of places, as you well know, not just around the world, but here in America. So, the ultimate purpose of Jesus' coming was to receive worship and to receive glory. And the angels were giving them that. The gospel saved sinners so we can join into the heavenly hosts that are already praising and worshiping God. That's why we're saved. We're saved ultimately to worship God throughout eternity. That's why the gospel came into the world. That's the reason that all things exist. You say, wait a minute, wait a minute. Don't I exist to do my job? Don't I exist to be a father or a mother? Don't I exist to do all these other things? Those are part, but ultimately you exist to glorify God with your life. And you will not feel fulfilled unless you are worshiping Him and glorifying Him with your life. You'll miss the mark. And by the way, you can worship God through your work. You can worship God through how you deal with your family. You can worship God in all of the mundane things. I just read an article from Albert Moeller. It talked about the glory of shaving. I sent it to the pastoral side. I didn't send it to all the staff because not all the staff shaves. But I send it to all the men. And he talks about God is even glorified in the... How many guys get tired of shaving? I mean, I don't shave on Saturday. I get tired of shaving. Some of you shave all the way across the top and all the way across the bottom and all the way from the front to the back. You just shave it all. But I see those knicks around. But you can glorify God in the very mundane things of life. We worship God in every way if our heart is lifted up to Him. Not just when we come to church. So this is the reason all things exist. And we have the privilege of joining with the angels who worship God and have from a long, since the time of their creation, for thousands of years, they have been worshiping God. And because we get saved, we have the privilege and we're lifted to the status of becoming worshipers and joining in the chorus line of millions of gone before, both the angels and men that are now worshiping God. We don't know exactly how many angels appeared here with Gabriel. I'm assuming this is Gabriel because he's the one that had given the message to Mary. But all of a sudden now, a multitude, tens of thousands, a vast array of angels. I'm sure heaven wasn't vacated, but I'm sure a lot of angels appeared in the sky. More than perhaps had ever been seen in human history. They joined the single angel and did what God's messengers always do, praise and glorify Him. Why were the angels, by the way, so interested in this? The Bible tells us in Hebrews that angels desire to look into the redemption of mankind. Angels kind of scratch their head and say, man, I don't quite understand this whole thing, but it sure is curious to me. The angels want to understand God's plan. And no doubt, God somewhere in the past had informed the heavenly host of His plan for the redemption of mankind. And the angels who do not sin are looking at man on earth and the debauchery and the fallenness and the wickedness and the intentions of their heart. The Bible says they're only evil continually. And the angels must blush in heaven. and wonder why would God redeem mankind? And God has no doubt had explained to them the redemption of mankind and they understood humanity's fallen nature into sin and that Jesus, the second member of the majestic Trinity, was going to leave glory and he was going to lay aside his riches and lay aside his glory, not his deity, but his glory and step into time and robe himself in human form. And ultimately, suffer. He'd have a crown of thorns pressed through his skin and into his skull. And they would whip him until the skin was ribboned on his back and he would have the loss of blood. And they would spit in his face and pull out his hair. And they would nail him cruelly to a cross where he had to shove himself up every time he took a breath. And then he would collapse. And he did that for several hours until he said, it is finished. And he gave up the spirit. And the angels are looking into this. But now they're rejoicing with God. These angels understood the significance of Christ's birth and were praising God because they saw the beginning of the final phase of God's redemptive plan that's now coming to pass. And they're in awe. And they're praising God. We'll close with this. Look at this last phrase here in verse 14. Glory to God in the highest. and on earth peace, goodwill towards men." The phrase, peace on earth and goodwill towards men, is not a quaint greeting that we use at Christmas time. Or is it some kind of a pleasant sentiment? We just hope goodwill pervades over the earth and everybody gets along. That's not what this is saying. It's kind of an awkward and unfortunate Translation literally, it is saying, may God's peace. How do we get God's peace, by the way? Through reconciliation to Him and through redemption. May God's peace, only people that have God's peace are those who have been saved, those who have been born again, those who have been redeemed. So it says literally, may God's peace be enjoyed by those whom he has granted salvation. That's a literal rendering of that. May God's peace that comes from reconciliation reign in the hearts of those that God has given salvation to. That's not something we earn. That's not something we deserve. You don't get to heaven because you're better than the next guy. You don't get to heaven because you earned God's good will or His peace. It is given to you. For most of us, we weren't looking for God. God stepped into our lives, so it's saying, may God's peace, found only through reconciliation, be enjoyed by those whom He has granted salvation. Salvation is not something we earn or merit. It is the gift of God. Not of worse, lest some man should boast. Titus 3.5 If God was pleased to allow you to hear and believe the good news of the Gospel, then respond obediently as these shepherds did in their worship of the Lord. What does the Bible say? They said, we've got to go see this thing that's happened, that's been proclaimed to us. We've got to check this out first hand. We've heard the story. Let's confirm it. And they went and checked out the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, and they saw him in a manger. Nobody else was in that kind of a situation. No other babies were in that kind of situation. It was confirmed to them. And then they went through, instead of doing the natural thing, which was, hey, we can't leave our flocks. The wolves, the coyotes or the thieves will get in there. The natural thing would be to go back. But they said, we're not going to do that. Let's go into Bethlehem. Let's go into the surrounding environment and tell people this good news. And so they did. So they responded obediently in worship and in the proclamation of His coming. Do we respond that way? We should. The worship of God. The proclamation to others.