12/24/2019 Christmas Eve Service

What is prey? ORD May the meditations of our hearts and the words of my lips be pleasing in your sight. our Rock and Our Redeemer amen

We've gathered together this evening. I can remember a gathering together. It called a midnight mass. I get late Christmas Eve worship service going back to when I was probably six or seven but I never really understood why it was always really cool the lights right like the lights will go down later and we'll have the candle lights and we'll Sing Silent Night and the spirit will move in and will feel some pretty strong emotions and it will be wonderful and on spy ring.

Doesn't necessarily answer the why. So I thought we might take a little bit this evening and talk about the why the why we do this every year year after year as if something has changed.

But maybe something has. Or maybe it will.

this

Christ Candle that we light we light it This one night every year. I remember it my first appointment. I was cleaning the the vestibule and I was picking up some things for the Advent season and I picked up this really big candle and I saw a spider. And I immediately dropped the Christ Candle and it shattered. They're like a hundred bucks a piece. All right, like it's no joke, but but I was really worried what I had done it and that's because this candle represents God's greatest gift to us. The gift of Jesus Christ his only begotten son. That gift didn't start. On the night in which he was born? It started all the way back in the process by which we read Isaiah earlier in the profits that spoken for told about Jesus is coming, but it even goes back before then. Goes back to the Garden of Eden. to Adam and Steve and though sometimes we want to put all of that emphasis on Evie's wasn't acting alone. There were two other actors in that and one was the serpent or the temperature and the other one was Adam. And before then they were in relationship with God. And things were perfect. but we have free will. and sometimes we just don't handle that very well. And so Adam and Eve broke that and they were cast out of the Garden of Eden. The Old Testament is full of God's reclaiming love being stalled out to God's people and each time like any Love Story. There was a maybe one day but not yet or people got lost in following other gods and idols. With God's love continued to try to find a way to break through. to God's people and let me clarify what I mean when I say God's people. Not just those of us gathered here. But all of creation all people, what are they heard the story of Jesus Christ where they've heard it. and chose not to follow This candle represents God's love come to Earth. This Advent series if you had an opportunity to worship with us is about God With Us. God With Us brings. Hope God With Us brings Joy God With Us brings peace and God With Us brings love. the last one the culmination of it all God With Us brings Christ and that's God's love reaching out to you. And to me now. I am going to assume for a second that there was a time somewhere between 8:45 and 9:45 that you had to make a decision.

Something went like this.

Are we going to go this year?

I don't know. Are the kids done playing their games? Who's going to make it through? Some kind of decision happened and that kind of prodding of the spirit. That's a work of God you're here tonight for a reason because you followed God providing through the work of the Holy Spirit. We're not going to get there yet. We're going to stay on Jesus for a second here. But God With Us brings Christ and that makes all the difference. You know. About two weeks ago. I got a phone call from someone in the congregation who had perceived a need of some of our elderly brothers and sisters in the community who could maybe use some love at Christmas and they wanted to know if it was okay if if we we got some things together and we maybe went caroling with Christmas carols and could drop them off. Now that is a work of the spirit that's us following where Christ is having us to go to reach out to one another to love our neighbor. And that starts with loving God with all your heart with all your soul and with love with all of our mind and loving our neighbor as ourselves. That's possible because of this. And because of that. But that's not a One Moment In Time. See, it's not just that Jesus gave God gave us this gift to Jesus Christ, and we opened it one time and we're still trying to figure out how to put all the parts together. But rather we have an opportunity to open it everyday. And when we do work all do an action in that action is the work that we do is a church. And then action exists because God With Us Rock Christ. And Christ changed everything for you and for me. There's no reason. I'm up here as a pastor in any better position than anyone else who follows Jesus Christ. I lost my cool the other day and I kind of let some words fly and my twelve-year-old reminded me that I'm a pastor. Aren't you supposed to be closer to God that was an invitation for a sermon which I then gave. about how no We're all in this we're all seeking where Christ is leading each and every one of us and sometimes it's easier than other times. But the reality is we've all been changed by what God has done. You know.

I'm a late gift getter.

I was at stores in Effingham at 9 this morning picking up gifts at my wife picked out for herself earlier this week. That's right. Ladies. I'm an amazing husband. And then I was there helping with appetizers and you know some of those smaller gifts that we give one another I forgot all about the And here I was like is Dollar General open at 4, so we found out. In walking around there. I couldn't help but remember a friend had shared something that she had seen at Dollar General just today Mary. It was a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup Easter egg in my right. They were sold out by the time I got there. But the reality is so many times. We want to think about Christmas as if the culmination of Christmas is Easter. We just want to jump from one to the other. The whole point of Jesus's birth is Jesus's death and Resurrection.

It's too simple God's much richer than that and part of what God did when God sent his son. Is that that after the Ascension God sent something else? We call the Holy Spirit that's part of what led you here today helped you make that decision. It's probably also helped you in terms of giving if you've ever passed by some people or some buckets and something stirred in you and so will maybe I should give and then maybe you were frustrated cuz all you had was a 20, but you decided to give anyway. See some of the ways the Holy Spirit works his by prodding us to action because we have to know that we have to have some sort of response to what God has done.

And so this Christmas season, I want to encourage you to open up the best gift that you've ever received. the gift of Jesus Christ the gift that we can open up year after year and day after day and find something new that God is telling us God's love is here for all people. You know Jesus experienced. for Humanity Jesus had friends. Jesus had a friend that died Lazarus and he wept for his friend. So if it this Christmas season, you're remembering those who have went on before and quite frankly you miss them. God knows what it's like to miss people to. And then Jesus had some other friends and and before or after they they met him in the upper room. they weren't really always very good at understanding what he was saying anyway, but they leave in they just up and left and ran. So if this Christmas season you're frustrated by broken relationships. Price had frustration with his friends and family as well.

You know.

in a little bit We're going to sing Holy Night. we're going to get our candles after we come through and receive communion and you can get them on either side and I learned that I have to remind people every year from the first service at Toledo. But if the person with the lit candle hold it straight up and down the person with the unlit candle goes into light it there's a lot less crying. So that's good. Okay, but but the other part of that is when we do light the candles were going to light from this candle. That's where we get our life from and so if this season you're frustrated by trying to love people or you're frustrated in your interactions with people or you might feel like you don't have enough. Love to give I want you to remember something. Not your love you love with anyway. God's love God's light that shines in you and in me and that we shine for all the world. So anytime you feel in despair or frustrated? rest in the assurance that God loves them and God loves you and God will Empower you to love them and for them to feel loved to that's the gift of Christmas. It's God's never ending Love Letter to humanity. That's why we gather every year. We know the story.

We know its power. May we continue to share it? And delivered every day. Let us pray.

Lord

Help us. to see Christ Anil

Move in us to share your love through our actions.

sustainus When we are weak. Are we are weary?

Give us vision.

And help us to follow the Holy Spirit. Wherever you may lead. I'm in.