Three of the shepherds who heard the angels' message and hurried to find Jesus look back on the event from the present day.
Shepherd 1: They're singing our song again.
Shepherd 2: It's amazing that, all these years on, they're still singing about us. I mean, we were only ordinary people.
Shepherd 1: That's oral tradition, that is. Things stick in people's minds. Stories get passed on. We told people what we saw, they told other people. The mother who stored it all up in her heart — she told someone else... And so on, till someone wrote it down, and other people copied it, then it got printed, then put on floppy disk and CD, then the internet, Instagram and TikTok.
Shepherd 3: (Interrupting) I wish I'd never asked!
Shepherd 2: Even so, we were just ordinary people, minding our own business...
Shepherd 3: And our sheep.
Shepherd 1: Yes, ordinary shepherds minding our sheep, but what we saw wasn't ordinary. Those angels! The music filled the air and our ears, and our hearts!
Shepherd 2: Yeah, it was mind-blowing. It was before fireworks, and laser shows, and YouTube. Before telephones, and space flight and drones. Seeing all that was unexpected, scary…
Shepherd 1: Awesome.
Shepherd 2: Extraordinary.
Shepherd 3: Yeah OK. But the stable was ordinary. With animals and hay and stuff.
Shepherd 2: In the cold night you could see the animals' breath in the lantern light.
Shepherd 3: And a baby. That was ordinary, people have babies all the time.
Shepherd 1: Those quick little breaths as he slept. And then when she unwrapped him to change him, those little fingers: perfect in miniature.
Shepherd 3: And that cry!
Shepherd 1: But don't you see? That's it... the ordinary became special. The promise and potential for life and love in every baby, became the hope for eternal life in God's love in that baby.
Shepherd 2: Ordinary life became special, because he shared in it.
Shepherd 3: Ordinary blokes like us became special because we were there, and willing to go and look.
Shepherd 1: That's what Jesus does — makes the ordinary special — that's what 'holy' means, that is — the ordinary being special.
Shepherd 2: So it's a shame when the special becomes ordinary.
Shepherd 1: When tinsel and turkey become a chore.
Shepherd 2: When paper and parcels mean more than the love that gives them.
Shepherd 3: When the special wonder of God in everyday life gets lost in Christmas musak.
Together: We wish you a holy and happy Christmas.
Based on a drama sketch which first appeared in the book Angels Delight , NCEC, 1999, now out of print.