Christmas Eve Service
God’s Christmas Card
Once again, it’s time for Christmas, and one of the things most people do is send Christmas cards via e-mail or regular mail to family and friends. And these cards usually center around Jesus in the manger scene, and the angel’s proclamation of “Peace on earth, good will to men.”
And if I could, once again we’re celebrating Christmas in troublous times, and while we read and say the phrase, “Peace on earth, goodwill to men,” we see very little of it.
We are still fighting wars on several fronts.
We’re fighting a cultural war as social unrest is rampant in our nation and the world, and let’s not forget the war on terror that has never gone away.
We are also fighting battles in this world, battles between nations and people groups all bent on killing one another, and innocent bystanders, and this extends within our own country as well.
Violence is now more of the norm, and is on the uptick in our major cities. And then there is the increased violence within our schools.
And to top it all off, we're seeing an increase in illnesses and fatal disease, along with natural disasters and famine around the world.
Now, these sorts of pictures really don’t make for good Christmas card photos. And these are not the scenes we think about when we think of Christmas, scenes like chestnuts roasting on an open fire, or Bing Crosby’s “I’m dreaming of a white Christmas.”
But maybe we can get a glimpse through these images of what was going on in the world and in the land of Israel on that very first Christmas. The Roman Empire ruthlessly controlled the nation of Israel. Acts of terrorism by religious zealots were commonplace with the Romans retaliating with ruthless savagery. And religion was making rules with severe punishment if broken.
It was to this world that Christmas came, and God broke through a world filled with turmoil.
And it is this same story of Christmas that God breaks through into our world as well. In this world filled with turmoil and chaos, Jesus can break through and bring that same peace that was promised by the angels into the lives of those who will believe.
In other words, God sends to this earth a Christmas card with the same pictures He has sent every year since that first Christmas. It is a picture designed to bring hope and peace to all who will embrace it. It is the picture of Jesus’s birth.
And what this picture says is that in the midst of our troubles, trials, and tribulations, we can have the peace and hope God promised through it.
Let’s take a closer look at this wonderful picture.
The first thing that captures our attention is The Star, which represents God’s Direction for our Lives.
It is the light that guided the Magi to the child Jesus. What this star represents is our receiving directions for our lives. This was no ordinary star. It was a divinely commissioned light.
Maybe you’ve been wondering if anything’s going to change?
Maybe life isn’t adding up the way you thought it should? and
Maybe you’re thinking that there’s no such divinely commissioned light for you.
But God has given and commissioned for each person such a light, and it’s just as bright today as it was back then. And that light is the divine light of God’s word, the Bible.
The Psalmist says, “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” (Psalm 119:105 NKJV)
We need the light of God’s word to help guide us through these troublous times, and as we read it, God’s light will shine in our hearts and in our minds to dispel the darkness and evil that Satan covers our world in.
Next, we see The Stable, which represents Jesus Becoming One of Us
Now, when our eyes move from the star to the stable, the first thing we notice is the inherent inconsistency of the whole thing. Here, God divinely commissioned a heavenly light but couldn’t provide a room in the Bethlehem Hilton.
But the stable is as divinely commissioned as the star.
Now, stables back in the days of Jesus weren’t made of wood as we so often see in the pictures, rather it was cave. A cold, dark, dank, and smelly cave, that surrounded Joseph, Mary, and Jesus with the wonderful aroma of manure.
What the stable is saying is that Christmas is all about Jesus becoming one of us so that He would know exactly what we go through. The stable is saying that God sent His Son to experience the full force of this sin filled and dominated world in order to defeat it through His death and resurrection.
The writer of Hebrews describes Jesus just this way saying, “For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin.” (Hebrews 4:15 NKJV)
What the stable reveals is that when we’re going through the pain and disappointments of life, we can know that we have a Savior who completely understands, because He’s already been there, done that, and cares for us.
Next in our picture we see The Wise Men, which tells us Christmas is all about Searching and Finding the Truth.
We really don’t know a whole lot about these Wise Men, that is, who they are or how many of them made the trip. What we know is that they were educated and wealthy. They are sort of a combination of many different fields of science: a little bit astronomer, astrologer, and philosopher.
Today we might call them truth seekers, and when they saw this star, they were willing to do whatever it took to find the answer.
Very few people, however, make this sort of commitment to search for the truth. But if they do, then God promises they will find Him.
The Lord said, “And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart.” (Jeremiah 29:13 NKJV)
Then we see Joseph and Mary, which reveal that Christmas is all about God Using Ordinary People for His extraordinary purpose.
God’s chose them because they trusted in Him. You see, God uses people who desire to do His will instead of their own. God is looking for those that will make themselves available to be used in His service.
And so, we should make the same proclamation as Mary who said, “Behold the maidservant of the Lord! Let it be to me according to your word.” (Luke 1:38 NKJV)
And then there are The Shepherds, which represents Communicating the Good News.
Now, these shepherds could be considered a combination of both Joseph, Mary, and the Wise Men, but with one difference. They communicated the Good News they witnessed.
As God sent Jesus into this world, Jesus says that He is then sending us.
“As the Father has sent Me, I also send you.” (John 20:21 NKJV)
And so, God uses ordinary people like you and me, which is represented by Joseph and Mary, who seek after His truth, like the Wise Men, to tell the world the Good News of Jesus Christ, like the shepherds.
The last thing I want us to focus upon is The Manger, which is all about God’s Transforming Power.
It was into the manger that the baby Jesus was laid, who is none other than the Lord God, creator of heaven and earth.
But it wasn’t a cute little baby cradle, nor was it a nice wood one we see in the picture with clean hay. It was a large hewed out rock. It was cold, smelly, with cattle saliva and old chewed up food. And it was here that they laid Jesus, after they laid some hay over top of the other stuff.
The Manger reveals that Christmas is about God’s transforming power. It is symbolic of what can happen to ordinary people when Jesus Christ, God’s Son, resides within them.
We are all mangers, that is, standard run of the mill ordinary sinners full of all sorts of gunky re-chewed up stuff. But when we make that choice to accept Jesus into our lives, He makes us brand new creations in Him and a part of God’s divine family.
Tonight, allow Jesus to bring such a transformation in your life? Accept Him as your Savior, and you will experience the promise declared by the angels, peace, and God’s favor.
Just as Jesus broke through the confusion and chaos back then, He wants to break through the confusion and chaos and be born anew in every life. Where “Unto us, this day, can be born a Savior who is Christ the Lord.”
So, into this troubled world, God sends the same Christmas card with the picture of Jesus’s birth. Will you accept it, open it up, and receive the truth of what it represents; and that is a new life.
The fundamental message of Christmas isn’t peace on earth good will towards men, although that is a good message. Rather
The fundamental message of Christmas is that God sent forth His Son, Jesus, so that whoever believes in Him will not perish but have everlasting life.
The fundamental message is that Jesus came to be that perfect sinless sacrifice for us, to take our place and die the death we deserve due to our sins, because as the Bible says, the wages of sin is death and there is no one righteous, no not one.
Tonight, as we celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, let that birth come alive in you, and let His light shine brightly for all to see.
We now come to the candle lighting part of our service.
When it comes to the birth of Christ, the Old Testament prophesied that He, that is, the Messiah, would be the light that would come and shine in the darkness.
“The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in the land of the shadow of death, upon them a light has shined.” (Isaiah 9:2)
Jesus is the light that shines in all or our hearts, driving out the darkness. And in that He is calling us to be that light to others.
“You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden.” (Matthew 5:14 NKJV))
Paul in his letter to the Corinthian church tells us, “For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ made His light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.” (2 Corinthians 4:6 NIV)
And so, Jesus tells us to take this light and shine it for all to see and give glory to God.
“Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.” (Matthew 5:16 NKJV)
And so, tonight, let this candle be a representation of the light that Jesus has given for us to shine, and as you lift it up, let this be your lifting the light of Jesus for all those who are still living in the darkness that they would see the light of Jesus shining in you and come out of the kingdom of darkness and enter into God’s Kingdom of Light.
