Theme: The Christ-child as a sign of salvation

Exegetical note
The humble shepherds are directed to the swaddled child in the lowly manger by an angel messenger, who tells them, not that he is the expected messianic Savior, but only that their finding him will be a "sign" of the arrival of the Christ. That indirect way of designating the identity of the baby may well be Luke's way of underscoring that the holiness of the manger's humble occupant not only could not have been obvious to any observer, had it not been revealed to them by God, b…