Week 4: Positioned for Joy

Photo by Melody Lawhorn

by Katie Harding on December 20, 2021

Have you ever been in the right place at the right time, almost like it was a coincidence that something occurred at the same place where you were?

One New Year’s morning about 30 years ago, that’s exactly what happened. I was on my way to church and my family stayed home because we had been at our friends’ house playing games much too late the night before, saying goodbye to one year and ringing in the next. But I needed to be there to teach my second-grade class that morning. It was quiet on the roads as most of the community was probably still sleeping like my family or not venturing out due to the snow that had fallen. It doesn’t take much snow to keep Northern Virginians home.

As I came upon a dip in the road, I stopped suddenly. At the bottom of the dip, a car was stuck. Their wheels were spinning on ice, so they couldn’t get enough traction to make it up the hill on the other side. While I was wondering what to do — wait or turn around and go a different way — another car appeared behind me. Two guys got out, went down the hill, gave the car a push, and motioned for me to proceed. I did so slowly, careful not to hit them. As I came to the bottom, they got behind my car to push it and make sure I could make it up as well. “Wow!” I thought, that was a blessing to get there when I did, treating it like a coincidence. But was it really? I glanced in my review-mirror expecting to see the men climbing the hill back to their car, and they were gone. Their car was gone, too. There was no way they could have scaled the hill, gotten to their car, and left that fast, but they weren’t there. In that moment I realized it was no coincidence, I was positioned for a blessing only God could have provided, as I had just encountered His angels.

For the shepherds in the fields outside of Bethlehem, it would be easy to think they too were in the right place at the right time. But they didn’t just happen to be there on the hills of that little town that night. They were where they were every night, tending to their flock. Many shepherds overseeing one flock on the hills outside of Bethlehem — the same hills that were considered to be outside the city of Jerusalem. These shepherds were raising Paschal lambs for Passover. Paschal lambs were young unblemished lambs to be offered to God in sacrifice. Thousands of families would be traveling to Jerusalem several months later and planning to purchase their Paschal lamb for their Passover celebration. These shepherds were making sure that could happen. They were poor, doing work that was messy and dirty, and were looked down upon by others in society. But God saw them — doing what needed to be done when it needed to be done. They were positioned for the greatest experience of their lives. The ones who raised the Paschal lambs for God’s people were the first ones to see the Paschal lamb of God for ALL PEOPLE.

An angel came and stood among them saying, “I bring you good news of great joy..."

Sometimes we drag our feet, hesitate, procrastinate, or line up on the side of fear rather than faith, failing to do what needs to be done when it needs to be done. We miss out on what God has planned for us and later think, “If only.” What is it God is calling you to do that you haven’t done yet? It’s not too late to position yourself for what God has in store for you by being obedient to what He has asked of you. I received the blessing I did that early New Year’s morning not because I was doing anything other than being faithful in following through in what I was asked to do. The shepherds likewise. As you prepare to celebrate the birth of God’s Paschal lamb this week, plan to meet Him at the manger and position yourself for joy!