Why to we so lowly, Lord?

So many reasons, Child.  In this moment, I became as you, the Shepherd, come near to abide with my flock.  I needed the world to see, to turn their eyes to the picture of what I had come to do, what I had come to become to you.  Perhaps I came to you so dearly because I share your heart, a deep and abiding love for those who are so very lost, so very wayward and helpless.  I, like you, am here to give up my life for those in my care.

As a shepherd abides with his sheep, lives among them, so–at this very moment– have I come to do.  And you, just as sheep, you may feel the abiding presence of the Great Shepherd in your midst.  You may know the peace of resting in my loving embrace, you may experience the provision of my mighty hand, you may follow the direction of my all-knowing gaze, and you may embrace life in the fullness of being called mine.

In watching you, the world may come to know my heart.

But there’s more.  I came for you all.  I came for the middle class business man.  I came for the rich and the learned.  And I came for the lowly, in lot and in life.  I knew you’d be least likely to believe that the King would come to you.  I knew you needed to know: I came for you.

This story is not one of shepherds abiding.  It is one of the Great Shepherd who on this night came forth to forever abide.  

It is to the lowly, the lonely, the downcast, the outcast, it is to the common and the lost, the wanderer and the downtrodden that the Mighty One came.  It is to you.