"The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told." Luke 2:20
The shepherds are an awesome bunch.  They didn't have anything to offer Mary and Joseph, didn't come to the manger to show off or measure up.  They didn't come out of obligation.  They didn't come with phoniness.  They came because something spectacular had happened to them, and during that angelic encounter they were given a promise.

God has many promises for us in the Bible.  Sometimes we just sit and do nothing and God's promises are revealed.  But sometimes His promises are two-fold:  do something, and He will do something greater.  That's what happened to the shepherds, right?  They were told to go and search, and they would find the Christ child.  And the angel told them how to find Him:  He will be the one who is wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.  Because they followed the angel's instructions, they were the first of all mankind to witness the Messiah.

What promises does God have in store for you?  What has He asked of you?  Do you think He asks more of you than He did of the shepherds? (Let me take a second here.  I have typed the word shepherds about 50 times over the last three days.  Spelled it wrong every single time.  What's up with that?)  It couldn't have been easy for the shepherds to go into Bethlehem, where they wouldn't have been eagerly embraced, and go door to door looking for a baby!  But they went, and when they had seen Jesus, it's easy to imagine they went back to those same homes, and told them what they had seen:  "When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child."  Luke 2:17    The shepherds didn't wait for Jesus to come to them.  They got up!  They took off!  They moved.  They acted on the information they were given.

Sometimes moving and acting look different then what we think.  Look at the favorite promise of countless Christians, Isaiah 40:31:  "But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength."  Waiting isn't a passive thing.  Waiting is an active, feet planted, not gonna move, not gonna be swayed, gonna hold onto my God no matter what it takes, kind of thing.  The important thing to see here is that our waiting is part of God's promise:  once we wait, He renews our strength.

Look at another promise:  Psalm 37:4.  "Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart."  First, delight in God.  Revel in Him, enjoy Him, drink Him in.  THEN He will give you the desires of your heart.  Why do you think God designed this promise this way?  Could it be because He knows that once we are swimming in the sea of His goodness, His love, His life, the desires of our heart could change?  The wants and wishes we have could become more like Him and His, setting us up for eternal success instead of failure?

Isn't that what today's verse is all about?  The shepherds returned to their fields, praising and glorifying God.  They were certainly delighted in Him, weren't they?  I'll bet they couldn't sleep that night!  Not only did they see the Messiah, but it happened exactly as they were told.  God's promises aren't negotiable.  What's that old song?  "God said it, I believe it, and that settles it for me!"  Think about that - not only did they go exactly as the angel had told them to, but they found exactly what the angel said they would find!

The shepherds (spelled it wrong again!) teach us so much.  It doesn't matter who we are, God wants to reach us.  God can use us.  They didn't let themselves become encumbered with physical, emotional or mental baggage, providing an excuse to not go when God called them.  And they took action, believing God's promise to be true.

Who would have thought a seemingly small part of the Christmas story could teach us so much about life?