During this season of Advent, we would like to share some short stories, scripture, poems and essays with you over the coming weeks regarding Jesus’s birth and the indescribable gift we have been blessed with should we chose to accept it. Today we are presenting “December 25…Or Thereabout” by Alfred Edersheim.

It was, then, on that “wintery night” of the 25th of December, that shepherds watched the flocks destined for sacrificial service, in the very place consecrated by tradition as that were the Messiah was to be first revealed. Of a sudden came the long-delayed, unthought-of announcement. Heaven and earth seemed to mingle, as suddenly an Angel stood before their dazzled eyes, while the out streaming glory of the Lord seemed to enwrap them, as in a mantle of light. Surprise, awe, fear would be hushed into calm and expectancy, as from the Angel they  heard, that what they saw boded not judgement, but ushered in to waiting Israel the great joy of those good tidings which he brought: that the long-promised Savior, Messiah, Lord, was born in the City of David, and that they themselves might go and see, and recognize Him by the humbleness of circumstances surrounding His Nativity.