Christmas Eve, 2011
Saturday December 24, 2011
7:00 p.m. and 10:30 p.m.
Processional: #269, Once In Royal David’s City
Greeting
Hymn of Praise: #270, Hark! The Herald Angels Sing
Sermon: Jesus Born into the Real World
Play video clip “Silent Night/7 O'clock news - Simon and Garfunkel” from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csfF4wVZYIs [2 minutes 1 second]
Jesus Christ was born into a world as real as any!
The trek to
Jesus' mother — a young woman
not even married.
His father — so far as the gossips of Nazareth were concerned— his father, unknown.
The first visitors who arrived to celebrate Jesus’ birth, were common laborers, still dirty from work.
And when King Herod learns about a newborn King who might one day threaten Herod’s reign, King Herod has all newborns under 2 years of age put to death!
So Jesus and his family
flee to
Born away from home, in less-than-ideal circumstances, our Lord does not get the easiest start in life.
It was, and it continues to be, into the real world that our God comes.
To the real world with all its imperfection and difficulty.
To the real world with its turmoils and tensions, its disagreements and challenges, its times of sorrow, uncertainty, and fear!
Whatever it is about the real world which beats us up, threatens us, or deeply frustrates us, God is there.
Today we celebrate the birth of God!
And it’s a birth into the real world!
Christ’s birth into the real world proclaims that all of life is embraced by our God1!
No matter how evil or how real the world is, it cannot banish God!
There is no place where you or I can hide from God!
In great love, our God continually and constantly comes down to seek us out!
Not just this holy night but every night and every day throughout our entire lives!
And so, no matter what, we are never abandoned by our God!
God continues to be among us!
And everything that happens on earth touches the heart of God!
Christmas is God’s embrace, God’s hug for each and every one of us.
Christ’s birth into the real world proclaims that God embraces us as we are!
Bishop Richard Smith, from the Manitoba/Northwestern Ontario Synod of our church, says: “the essence of the incarnation ...
is that God came into and among human existence as it is with all its limitations and flaws.
Christmas ... is a potent and palatable sign of God’s desire to embrace our brokenness.
It is no accident that this God, who desired to be with us as we are, was born in a feeding station.
Because that is why God came into our lives.
God came to nourish our brokenness, to feed our hungry souls.
Christmas truly shows us love among the ruins of our lives.”2
Christ’s birth into the real world makes it possible for us to become children of God!
By God’s grace and action, you and I are God’s sons and daughters!3
And that means we can stay with God forever!
In 1994, two volunteers were in
These boys and girls had been abandoned, abused, and left in the care of the government.
After telling the children about Mary and Joseph, and Jesus being born in a manger4, the volunteers describe what happened: “We gave the children 3 small pieces of cardboard to make a crude manger.
Each child was given a small paper square cut from yellow napkins.... No colored paper was available in the city.
Following instructions, the children tore the paper and carefully laid strips in the manger for straw.
Small squares of flannel, cut from a worn-out nightgown ... were used for the baby’s blanket.
A doll-like baby was cut from tan felt.... I got to one table where little Misha sat — he looked to be about 6 years old and had finished his project.
As I looked at the little boy’s manger, I was startled to see not one, but two babies in the manger.
Quickly I called for a translator to ask the lad why there were two babies in the manger.
Crossing his arms in front of him, and looking at his completed manger scene, the child began to repeat the story very seriously.
For such a young boy, who had only heard the Christmas story once, he related the happenings accurately — until he came to the part where Mary put the baby Jesus in the manger.
Then, Misha started to ad lib.
He made up his own ending to the story as he said, ‘And when Maria laid the baby in the manger, Jesus looked at me and asked me if I had a place to stay.
I told him I have no mama and I have no papa, so I don’t have any place to stay.
Then Jesus told me I could stay with him.... So I got into the manger, and then Jesus looked at me and he told me I could stay with him — for always.’
As little Misha finished his story, his eyes brimmed full of tears that splashed down his little cheeks.
Putting his hand over his face, his head dropped to the table and his shoulders shook as he sobbed and sobbed.
The little orphan had found someone who would never abandon or abuse him, someone who would stay with him — FOR ALWAYS.”
Christmas means that God comes to us among the ruins of our lives.
Christmas means that God loves us as we are.
Christmas means that God will always be with us.
Thanks be to God! Amen!
Hymn of the Day: #282, It Came Upon the Midnight Clear
Communion Hymns: #275, Angels, From the Realms of Glory
#277, Away in a Manger
#289, Angels We Have Heard on High
#279, O Little Town of
Post-Communion Carol: #288, Good Christian Friends Rejoice
Sending Song: #281, Silent Night
1This section based on “Politics, Religion and Christmas” by Bishop William Huras. The Eastern Synod Lutheran, Dec 1995, p.2.
2Bishop Richard M. Smith: “Hope for a Hurting People”. Canada Lutheran, Dec 2001, p.39.
3I John 3.1
4Told by “JoyinX@aol.com” Dec 22 1998 on sshop-sermons@lists.ecunet.org.