<p>2:20 <i>And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen, just as it had been spoken to them</i>- Again we see a connection between the beginning and ending of Luke's Gospel; for he concludes with the disciples praising God in the temple. These shepherds are presented as believers, as converts. They rejoiced in the fulfilment of what had been prophetically told them; and likewise the disciples at the end rejoiced when they perceived how the Old Testament prophetic word had been so accurately fulfilled in the things that happened to the Lord. The &quot;things heard and seen&quot;, the &quot;things&quot; preached by the shepherds (:18), the &quot;thing&quot; told by the Angels (:15), all clearly look forward to the &quot;things&quot; concerning the Kingdom and name of Jesus which Luke later says were the basis of the apostolic preaching (Acts 8:5,12). The shepherds are being set up as examples of preachers, telling forth the &quot;things&quot; of the Gospel which they had personally experienced- even when they appeared so strange to secular ears, and were testified by those apparently least qualified to be witnesses.</p>