1. 2025 Advent (Hanging of the Greens)

Welcome and Announcements:

Welcome and blessings upon each one of you this morning.  If you are joining us for the first time, you are in for a treat for today is the day that we usher in the season of Advent with our annual “Hanging of the Greens.”  It is always a festive occasion!  Directly following our service, we will proceed across the street for our Harvest dinner.  If you did not know that was happening today, please do not hesitate to join us.  There is always plenty of food to go around.

Allow me a few quick reminders.

· Our adult Sunday school class began a new subject today.  Dale Thamert is teaching from the book of Romans.  They have not gotten too far into it yet and so it is a good time to start attending.

· Next Sunday, there is the Elgin Ministerial Association’s Sounds & Tastes of Christmas here at 4 p.m.  It is a great gathering of people from the other churches and community people to kick off the Christmas season.  Various people come and sing, read poems, or read short stories.  Then we all proceed to the Bryant Center to enjoy a potluck of popular seasonal goodies.  An offering will be taken to help support the Elgin Ministerial Association. 

· Dec 14 is the Christmas Food Box distribution.  It is here as well.  You are welcome to donate food for these boxes if you wish or participate by providing an offering to the Elgin Ministerial Assoc for the meal items they provide.  The main Christmas staples of turkey, potatoes, vegetables, stuffing, and cranberries have been ordered by the Elgin Ministerial Assoc.  We will box the food up at 1:30 p.m. and we will be handing them out from 2:30-3:30 p.m

· And last, but not least, we welcome all to join us for our Christmas Eve service on Dec 24 @ 4 p.m.  This is a great time to invite friends and family.  We hope you can all join us.

Without further ado, let’s move to the Hanging of the Green!

Hanging of the Greens

Holidays can breeze in and flyby so fast that it is easy to miss the significance of them.  However, Christmas and Easter are not just any holiday, they hold incredible significance that is for all nations and every man, woman and child.  For this reason, we try to slow down and take in each moment, including the approach and the arrival of both Christmas and Easter.

Today we kick off the season of Advent by recognizing the significance of the decorations we place about each year.  As we begin this morning, please stand as we open our service by singing a refrain from “Oh Come, All Ye Faithful.”

Refrain: “O Come, All Ye Faithful”

Introit (Pastor Lauri):

People, look east. The time is near

Of the crowning of the year.

Make your house fair as you are able,

Trim the hearth, and set the table.

People, look east, and sing today;

Love the Guest is on the way.

Hymn: “Come, Thou Long-Expectant Jesus”

Advent Trailer video

Advent Wreath: Lee & Judy Doud: Place and arrange advent wreath then light the first candle (Upper left purple candle)

Lee and Judy Doud will place our first decoration this morning, and it is the Advent Wreath.

Most often, but not always, this is arranged in a circle. The circular shape of the Advent wreath symbolizes the eternity of God, reflecting His unending love, mercy, and faithfulness. Candles are then placed in the wreath, each with a different name and symbolic meaning which we will talk about each week. Three of the candles are purple or sometimes blue, while one is pink and at the center is a white candle that is called, “The Christ candle.” This will be the final candle lit on Christmas Eve.

The season of Advent is comprised of the four weeks leading up to Christmas and it helps us to slow down and prepare for the spiritual significance of Christmas.

Many of us rush from Thanksgiving to Christmas trying to get everything done, but Advent invites us to pause and to wait. During this time, we look to the past as we remember the people of Israel who longed for God’s deliverance, and to the future as we eagerly anticipate the arrival of the kingdom of God in all its fullness. Every year during this time of waiting, we reflect on four themes: Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love.

Today, we remember that we are a people of hope, and that hope is not dependent on our circumstances but on the God of whom Isaiah 25:6–9 says,

“On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear. And he will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the covering that is spread over all nations; he will swallow up death forever. Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces, and the disgrace of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken. It will be said on that day, “See, this is our God; we have waited for him, so that he might save us. This is the Lord for whom we have waited; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.”

We light the candle of hope today as a reminder that, even in the darkness, God is at work, and one day the darkness will be no more.

Advent Candle Reading video

The prophecy which he quoted is but one of 80 specific prophecies concerning the coming of the Messiah.  The accuracy of all these prophecies is truly amazing.  Consider this: 

•     Prophets predicted the birthplace of the Messiah;

•     They predicted that the Messiah would be preceded by John:

•     and that the Messiah would make a triumphant entry;

•     They prophesied that the Messiah would be betrayed, 

•     and that he would be sold for 30 pieces of silver. 

•     They also prophesied of His death and crucifixion with transgressors.

Phillip Stoner, a mathematician, calculated the likelihood of only 8 of the 80 prophecies being fulfilled in one man.  He calculated that the odds of these predictions, which were made hundreds of years before Christ’s arrival, all coming true in Christ were 1 in 100 trillion.

 To illustrate the point, he said that if the state of Texas were covered by silver dollars, two feet deep, that would equal 100 trillion.  If you were to be blindfolded and were to pick one special silver dollar from the 100 trillion dollars, on the very first try, you would accomplish a comparable feat.

 The prophet’s candle reminds us of the prophets who announced Christ’s coming.  We can be thankful for their obedience in taking this message to the people, even though the people did not usually treat them kindly.

Before we continue with the placing of other decorations, please stand with me for the traditional reading of the...

LITANY OF THE GREENS

How shall we prepare this house for the coming of Jesus, the King?

With branches of cedar, the tree of royalty.

How shall we prepare this house for the coming of Jesus, the eternal Christ?

With garlands of pine and fir, whose leaves are ever living, ever green.

How shall we prepare this house for the coming of Jesus, our Savior?

With wreaths of holly and ivy, symbolizing His passion, death and resurrection.

How shall we prepare our hearts for the coming of Jesus, the Son of God?

By hearing again the words of the prophets who foretold the saving work of God.

For God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.

Glory to God in the highest!

At this time, Pastor Mouse will come and read Isaiah 40:1-5.  Please stand for the reading of the word and remain standing as we sing.

Pastor Mouse: Isaiah 40:1 – 5

Isaiah 40:1–5 NIV

1 Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. 2 Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her hard service has been completed, that her sin has been paid for, that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins. 3 A voice of one calling: “In the wilderness prepare the way for the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our God. 4 Every valley shall be raised up, every mountain and hill made low; the rough ground shall become level, the rugged places a plain. 5 And the glory of the Lord will be revealed, and all people will see it together. For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

Hymn: “O Come, O Come Emmanuel”

As John & Yvonne Bowling place our cedar branches in the windowsills, consider this passage from the book of Jeremiah.

John & Yvonne Bowling: Place the cedar branches in the window sills

Jeremiah 23:5–6 NIV

5 “The days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, a King who will reign wisely and do what is just and right in the land. 6 In his days Judah will be saved and Israel will live in safety. This is the name by which he will be called: The Lord Our Righteous Savior.

In ancient times the cedar was referred to as the tree of royalty. It also signified immortality, and was used for purification. We place this branch in the sanctuary as the symbol of Christ, who reigns as King forever, and whose coming, in justice and righteousness, will purify our hearts.

The next symbol is one we are all well acquainted with.  As Payton hangs the evergreen wreaths, consider these verses from Isaiah, yet again.

Payton High: Hang the wreaths on the hooks on the side walls of our sanctuary.

Isaiah 9:2 NIV

2 The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned.

Isaiah 9:6–7 NIV

6 For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. 7 Of the greatness of his government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on David’s throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this.

Because the needles of the pine and fir trees do not die each season like the leaves of most trees, the ancients saw them as symbols of things that last forever. In the Scripture passage just read, the prophet Isaiah tells us that there will be no end to the reign of the Messiah, and so we hang this wreath of evergreens shaped in a circle, which itself has no end, to signify the eternal kingdom of Jesus, the Christ.

Hymn: “Joy to the World” (first stanza)

Patty Hartley:  Place mistletoe

As Patty Hartley places our mistletoe, consider these details.  In our culture, mistletoe is often associated with a small sprig hung from the ceiling to provide lovers and chance to steal a kiss.  However, the true mistletoe of Christmas is found high up in a tree and it had nothing to do with romance.  Before I explain, consider this passage from Isaiah 61.

Isaiah 61:1–3 NIV

1 The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, 2 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, 3 and provide for those who grieve in Zion— to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor.

Because this is the passage that Jesus reads at the beginning of His ministry in the synagogue at Nazareth, and which He applied to Himself, we cannot hear these words of Isaiah without thinking of the healing that the coming of the Christ will bring. The evergreen most associated with healing properties in the ancient world was the mistletoe. It was called the “all-healer.” People thought its special powers came from the lightning bolt that fixed it high up in a tree, and therefore, they believed it came, as did the lightning, from heaven itself. This healing power was not only for physical ailments, but for the healing of relationships as well. It is said that in one town in medieval England, a bough of mistletoe was brought in and put on the altar, and the priest then declared a pardon for all sins. Originally, the kiss under the mistletoe was thought to have been the “kiss of peace,” symbolizing reconciliation, not the romantic kiss of a man and a woman. It is in keeping with this more ancient meaning that we decorate this house with mistletoe, in anticipation of the coming of the healing presence of Jesus the Christ.

Hymn: “Joy to the World” (second stanza)

As Tom and Helen Tucker arrange holly in our windowsills, consider these words from Isaiah.

Tom & Helen Tucker: Place the Holly.

Isaiah 53:1–6 NIV

1 Who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? 2 He grew up before him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground. He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. 3 He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem. 4 Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted. 5 But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed. 6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

Tradition holds that this passage from Isaiah describes the sufferings of Jesus, who saved us from our sins by His death on the cross, and by His being raised form the dead. In ancient times, the holly was considered the symbol of Christ’s passion; its prickly leaves suggested the crown of thorns, its red berries the blood of the Savior, and its bitter bark the drink offered to Jesus on the cross. As we hang the holly, let us rejoice in the coming of Jesus, our Savior.

Video?: A Strange Way to Save the World

We have in no way covered all of the decorations and symbols of Christmas. However, I hope you learned something new today which provides you a new appreciation of all the symbolism that surrounds you throughout the Advent and Christmas seasons. We have one final one but first, listen to this well appreciated passage from the book of John.

John 1:1–5 NIV

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

John 1:9–14 NIV

9 The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world. 10 He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. 11 He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. 12 Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—13 children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God. 14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

As we complete our decorations this morning, and as we anticipate the celebration of Jesus’ birth, the One we know is the Light of the World, I will light the Christmas Tree.  And in this time of Advent, whenever you see a lighted Christmas tree, let it call to mind the One who brings light to our darkness, healing to our unwholeness, and bringing peace to all who will receive Him.

Pastor Lauri lights the Christmas tree from the platform.

Hymn: “Joy to the World” (third and fourth stanzas)

Pam: Pray

HOPE of All the Earth

For many of us, this is one of the busiest times of the year.

We attend holiday parties hosted by coworkers, friends, and family.

We hurry to several different stores to find the perfect gift for everyone on our list.

We clean our houses until they are spotless so we can host others, or we make plans to visit family and friends for Christmas.

All too often, this season can feel overwhelming because it seems like there are not enough hours or days to do everything we want or need to do. This season often seems to demand that we rush. Rush, rush, rush...

But the church calendar invites us to take a different posture during this season—one of waiting. It seems we have spoken about this idea of waiting a lot lately. But I believe waiting is an act of faith. We trust God and His will, so we have patience to wait. I believe we see this in Jesus’ life. I never read anywhere, where Jesus was in a rush running anywhere. He was purposeful in everything He did, trusting and waiting on God and God’s timing. Even when He received word of Lazarus’ impending death, still He did not rush. In fact, He delayed. He trusted the Father.

In the church, today is the first day of the new year, also known as the first Sunday of Advent. Advent is the season when we remember the waiting that God’s people did before the Christ child came, and the waiting that we do now, for Christ to come again. We wait in eager expectation for the kingdom of God to come in all its fullness. During this busy season, Advent invites us to remember what God has done and to wait for what God will do.

And in this season of waiting, we are invited to recognize the brokenness of the world around us. You see, that is the advantage of waiting. It allows us time to observe the realities of this life. Satan wishes to spin us like a top, so we cannot see what is really happening around us. During Advent, we see and lament the ways that sin and death still hold sway in the world. The darkness of the world can seem overwhelming. Our waiting could lead us to despair if we let it. Which is why so many do not like being slow, being silent. The reality oppresses them and they would just assume ignore it. However, as believers in Christ, we can look at the reality without despair as we know that in Christ there is an answer which gives us hope.

We begin every church year by reminding ourselves that we are a people of hope. Today, we are reminded of this in Luke 2. Please stand with me as we read this well loved passage of Christmas.

Luke 2:1–7 NASB95

1 Now in those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus, that a census be taken of all the inhabited earth. 2 This was the first census taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. 3 And everyone was on his way to register for the census, each to his own city. 4 Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the city of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and family of David, 5 in order to register along with Mary, who was engaged to him, and was with child. 6 While they were there, the days were completed for her to give birth. 7 And she gave birth to her firstborn son; and she wrapped Him in cloths, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.

The Word of God for the people of God Thanks be to God!

Prayer

I. Hope Luke 2:1-3

I do not think you will find anyone that would argue with the fact that...

A. The world we live in is broken and darkness reigns.

Every time I turn on the news I see evidence of this fact. However, this is nothing new. This brokenness and darkness have existed since the time of Adam.

We see it even in our text today.

Luke 2:1 NIV

1 In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world.

This scripture begins with “in those days,” referring to an era of Israel’s history when the world seemed broken beyond repair and the darkness appears overwhelming.  Look at what they were facing in those days.  These times we are speaking of were…

1. The days of Israel.

And we find that...

a. Israel was under Roman control.

They had been an occupied nation for most of their last six hundred years. They had little control over their laws and often faced challenges to their worship practices.

b. Israel was heavily taxed by the Roman rulers.

“In that day” the Roman emperor was declaring a census, which would lead to more efficient taxation and further demonstrate Rome’s immense power.

“In those days”…

c. Israel had not heard from a recognized prophet in almost four hundred years.

They may not have been crazy about the prophets, but the voice of a prophet always reminded them that God had chosen them.  God was still there.  Now, however, they had to ask themselves if God had truly abandoned them forever?

Have things changed much?

2. We too, know those days when the darkness seems overwhelming.

 I do not fully comprehend what they experienced back then, but we have our own set of brokenness and darkness that seems to be continually intensifying.

a. Natural disasters have ravaged communities and loved ones.

Many days I feel like I see these from afar, but more recently they have come close by.  The fires that took place in Burns and nearby places last year caused so much financial upheaval that our church was turned down for insurance coverage this year because of it.  We found a new carrier, but at a great deal more expense.

We hurt for those who lost property and loved ones due to these fires and we are reminded how vulnerable we are as well.

b. It feels like there are always wars raging.

Even this has intensified.  It is no longer wars overseas, but we are experiencing our own political wars leading to violence right here in the United States.  It is beginning to feel like the nation is splitting apart again as it did with the war between the North and the South.  Once again, we see family members split by the conflicts.

c. We have experienced violence in our community and in the communities around us.

The attempts on President Trump’s life and the recent assassination of Charley Kirk and others are still burning up the airwaves. 

More locally, my heart has been torn over the recent prayer requests shared in Sunday school that reflect the violence of our own communities.  Here again, it is not just violence against another person, but even the violence people perpetrate against themselves as they take their own lives in suicide.

These tragedies just keep increasing!

d. We know ofrelationships that seem to be broken beyond repair.

Here again, we find this exemplified through a recent prayer request, so devastating that I hesitate to say it out loud.  We can all name families that have been divided by conflict and violence.

And finally, the one that has seemed like an ever-present darkness since the COVID virus erupted among us.

e. We experience the grief of our loved ones falling ill and dying, and wonder how we can go on without them.

Here again, there are many in our community, and even several in our own congregation dealing with this experience of loss.

All of these are devastating, and make us feel like we just want to turn up the volume and spin around like a top, so we need not notice or have time to dwell on it.  But then we look at scriptures like Luke 2and we are reminded of our hope.

3. We are reminded that there is hope in the darkness.

Why hope?  Because it was in “those days”…Those days of darkness and despair, that a baby was born.  A baby who was foretold by Isaiah that He would bring light to our darkness.

Isaiah 9:2 NIV

2 The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned.

It happened just as Isaiah said it would and we realize that…

a. In “those days,” God was already at work!

It wasn’t obvious as first. Things were happening that no one recognized or were aware of. People were being brought into place, details were beginning to happen that would later reveal the truth of what was occurring. You see,

i. God had already sent John the Baptist, the prophet who would prepare the way for the Lord.

For 9 months, he was in existence, carried in his mother’s womb. For nearly 30 years, he was growing up in preparation for the task that would be his to prepare people for the coming Messiah. This happened in the midst of the people and they had no idea. But there was more...

ii. God had also already announced to Mary the coming Messiah in the person of Jesus, whose birth we will celebrate in a few short weeks.

“In those days,” light was coming. The preparations were being made. The pieces set in place. It was at their door step and they didn’t even know it, “in those days.”

Today, too, when the darkness seems overwhelming, we can count on the fact that...

b. God is still at work in and through God’s church.

Yes, we are the means that God is working through. We bring light into this darkened world.

i. God has always worked through God’s faithful people to bring hope and peace to a world that suffers from despair and violence.

One such person was André Trocmé, a Protestant pastor in France during World War II, who worked and suffered to protect the Jewish people after Germany took over. Andre was no stranger to darkness. His mother was killed in a car accident when he was only 10 years old. In 1917, he became a refugee when his hometown was bombed by the Germans, exposing him to poverty and many hardships.

Years later, a school he founded became a safe haven for Jewish children. Under his leadership, the village and surrounding communities established a network of safe houses, forged documents, and facilitated the escape of Jewish refugees across the Swiss border through an underground railroad.

His story is only one of many, who reveal God at work in our world through the church. However, it is not only through God’s church that He is at work. You see,

4. God is also at work in the world around us.

God does not only work through the faithful, but God also works to direct men and nations to accomplish and fulfill His word. Look back with me once again to the days of Jesus’ birth. Those were foretold hundreds of years before. Look at what Jeremiah wrote some 600 years before Jesus’ birth.

Jeremiah 33:14–16 NASB95

14 ‘Behold, days are coming,’ declares the Lord, ‘when I will fulfill the good word which I have spoken concerning the house of Israel and the house of Judah. 15 ‘In those days and at that time I will cause a righteous Branch of David to spring forth; and He shall execute justice and righteousness on the earth. 16 ‘In those days Judah will be saved and Jerusalem will dwell in safety; and this is the name by which she will be called: the Lord is our righteousness.’

Did this just happen because of the faithful people of God?  No, God positioned, dates, cultures, circumstances, people both righteous and unrighteous, in their places to fulfill His Word and His purpose.  One great example is the prophet Isaiah naming Cyrus as the leader who would send an exiled Israel home.  Isaiah prophesied this 150 years before Cyrus was even born.  God is at work through all men and peoples.

And while He does...

a. God’s grace is always reaching out and drawing all people to God’s self.

His ultimate purpose is to draw us to Him and away from the brokenness and to the light.  His choice is that no one perishes in darkness, but that all will come to His light, warmth, and love.

Isaiah 9:1–2 NIV

1 Nevertheless, there will be no more gloom for those who were in distress. In the past he humbled the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the future he will honor Galilee of the nations, by the Way of the Sea, beyond the Jordan— 2 The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned.

Conclusion

In Luke 2:1–3, we are reminded that God is always at work, even during those days when the world seems to be the darkest.

The old hymn “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day” speaks to this hope in the darkness. Based on a poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow written during the American Civil War, the poem begins with the joy of hearing the Christmas bells proclaiming peace and goodwill. Then another sound rings out—the sound of cannons, shattering the speaker’s peace and throwing him into despair, believing that hatred and war have made a mockery of peace and goodwill. Yet then the bells ring out again, and the speaker hears this message of hope:

God is not dead, nor doth he sleep;

The Wrong shall fail, The Right prevail,

With peace on earth, good-will to men.

They made a movie about Wadsworth’s life and his writing of this hymn back in 2022.  It is worth watching.  There was lots of darkness in Wadsworth’s life.  But into his darkness, God brought light.

Just as Israel experienced the prophets foretelling of “in those days,” so we are fast approaching a different set of “in those days.”  Jesus taught of another time which he prefaced as, “in those days.”  The days Jesus spoke of will be the darkest ever experienced.  I cannot say if we will experience those days for sure, but if we do, we need to remember that in the darkest of times God is doing the greatest of work.  We need never despair as He will be revealed amongst us.

So, in the darkness, when despair threatens to overwhelm us, let us remember that our hope is in the God who neither slumbers nor sleeps and who will one day redeem and restore all of creation. This is our hope.  It is not a wishful hope, but it is a confident hope as it is founded on the God who has proven Himself able to accomplish all that He has said.

Pray

Song: I Heard the Bells...

Announcement:

If you have not checked your mailbox today, please do so before you go.  I have provided you with your first Christmas gift of the season.  Also in the packet is a devotional to help you slow down and appreciate the hope we have because of Jesus’ coming at Christmas.  I pray you will be blessed through this devotional.  It is free, but if you would like to help pay for the books, there are envelopes provided to do so.  Please place any contributions for the books in those envelopes so they get posted to the right place in our accounting.  Thank you!

As we close this portion of our service, we will also pray for the bountiful meal we are about to partake of, so please bow your heads.

Benediction- Dale Thamert