Christmas Story Fabulous-Fact-1: The Shepherds LIVED in the Fields with their Flocks

Could it be that the Shepherds actually LIVED in the Fields with their Flocks?

Note carefully what Scripture actually shares with us:

Lu 2:8 And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.

Scripture does not say the shepherds were ‘farmers - with houses, lands and stables’ - keeping watch or their flocks by night to keep away wolves and predators, etc.

Rather, Scripture specifically informs us there were “shepherds ABIDING in the field” ‘Abiding in’ is ‘living in'. [See Strong's Concordence & Lexicon - the Greek Standard from the 1800's]

Your ‘abode’ is your ‘home'.

To ‘ABIDE in Christ’ is to LIVE in Christ!

Had the Christmas Shepherds not been ‘abiding in-living in’ the fields, this Scripture would NOT have been given to us this way. It would have simply said: and there were shepherds in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.

However, this is NOT what God chose to reveal to us - and giving ALL Scripture by inspiration with Jesus declaring we live by EVERY WORD that proceeded out of the mouth of God - we are in gross error to IGNORE that these shepherds were ABIDING IN - that is LIVING IN in the fields: It is very simple, and it is indisputable.

We have missed such simple statements of fact BECAUSE of having seen a-thousand-and-more improper, Nativity Scenes of Christ's Birth. Thus we have preconceived ideas about who-&-what should be there.

We in the West also lack some knowledge of Middle-East culture. The Shepherds of the Christmas Story were “Nomadic Shepherds.”

There have long existed wandering herdsmen, called ‘Nomads', long before there were farmers with houses & stables. These ‘Nomadic Shepherds’ lived in the fields with their flocks -whether goats, sheep, camels or cattle - and traveled with them seeking pasture in the desert-like regions.

Such shepherds were Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac, Jacob, Esau, Joseph's brethren - and Joseph too, before he was sold into slavery - Moses, Jethro, King David, and many of the Prophets.

‘Bedouins’, they are called in the Middle East. They were there for thousands of years before Christ, and they are there today. This writer has personally been there and walked among them.

Nomadic Bedouins have long been poor, without means, and status. Yet God Almighty chose Nomadic Shepherds over the High Priest & Levites, over Sadducees & Herodians, over the Lawyers & Scribes, to send a ‘sky-full-of-Angels’ magnifying & praising the Christ . . .

. . . along with a personal message & instruction from ALMIGHTY GOD to these humble Shepherds - ABIDING - literally living in the fields: that His Son - and their Saviour - was born that day in the City of David: Bethlehem!

The humility of the Christmas Story can not be over-emphasized. Indeed these Bedouins were somewhat reminiscent of Christ-the-Teacher exclaiming: “The foxes have holes and the birds have nests: but the son of man - and He easily could have said ‘the son of God!’ - has no place to lay His head!"

Christ DID have a place to lay his head at birth - the borrowed manger - but even that was temporary.

To learn more about the Shepherd's living in the field's - with their families - attending the Birth of Christ, please see the following: