Merry Christmas to All!

Introduction: God Welcomes Everyone

Merry Christmas! That’s got to be one of the sweetest greetings of the whole year: a greeting of hope, a greeting of joy and good humor, a greeting of love. And it’s a greeting that draws our hearts and our thoughts in some way to this night with Mary and Joseph, with shepherds and angels, and most importantly with the child, lying in a manger — with Jesus.

Every year we’re drawn in some way by the gentle poetry of Luke’s story about the birth of Jesus and that first Christmas in Bethlehem; drawn to the hope of the world, drawn to the hope of God to the hope and the light that pushes away the darkness of our fears revealed to us in the form of a baby child, born in a stable. Now some of us are drawn to the manger this night because we believe in our heart of hearts and in the way we live our lives, we believe. We believe that God came down in human form to show us who God is and to save us from ourselves, to save us from our sins and our loneliness and our fears, to save us so that we can really live.  We believe and are here this night to pay homage, to give thanks, to offer our lives anew for this great gift of God’s love revealed in the child. And I bid you Merry Christmas!

Now others of us are drawn here because we once believed & we’d like to believe again; we come with some kind of remembrance of the love, the peace and the hope that comes to us only from God’s presence and love at work in our lives.  We long to know and to live that fearless reality again. We’ve come because we long for our lives to be different. We want to know in our heart of hearts that God loves us and that we are His. We come, hoping for God to touch our lives, our souls, our hearts — to touch us in some way with His grace and goodness. And I bid you Merry Christmas!

And others of us are drawn here tonight because,  Although we’ve never believed or even hoped to believe in Christ as Savior; or to become involved in a Christian community and Christian life; we still respect the tradition or honor the wishes of family and friends. We come because we wouldn’t by our absence tonight, spoil the holiday for our loved ones. And I bid you all a very Merry Christmas!

Welcome this Christmas Eve, for behold, along with the heavenly hosts of God; behold, I bring you tidings of great joy for all people — for those of us who believe, for those of us who long to believe again, and for those of us who are here for other reasons. Fear not, for all of us a Savior has been born; for all of us a gift has come into our world and it’s good news; better still, it’s saving news. Christmas, the coming of God into our world as one of us, reveals God’s love for all people, for everyone, including you and me, and it’s a gentle love; a love that overcomes our fears, but a love that won’t overcome our free wills.

For God has not come to us tonight in His power and glory to force us to love Him. Instead God comes in the form of a baby child, helpless to overpower anyone; but willing to offer His love, His hope, and His saving grace for everyone. And we are just the people He wants to touch tonight — people He loves enough to come for Himself.

We Are in the Story

That God has come in human form for all people is one of the most incredible parts of the story tonight. And we know that God has come for all of us because we’re all there; we’re all there in the story. There are believers in the story, at least two of them – Joseph and Mary. Joseph sets aside his fears and believes. Believes that this child would be the Savior of the world, the Son of God. He had received a powerful message in a dream and was willing to take Mary as his wife and to care for the child as his own. Mary allowed the power of God to take away her fears because the angel had announced God’s favor on her — God’s love for her — and she’d been willing to offer herself in return to bear this child. The child who would save the world and offer the way back to God.

There are also people there in the story who once believed or who wanted to believe again. Every day people who were keeping watch over their flocks by night, watching, looking, longing for something more, ready to accept God’s grace and promise of a new life if offered. Even though the angels terrified them they overcame their fear and followed the angels’ calling and went to Bethlehem in the hope that their longing would be fulfilled.

And, like some of us here tonight, there are people in the story who didn’t believe at all. People who had no idea anything important was taking place in Bethlehem.  From Emperor Augustus and the Governor, Quirinius, to some of Mary and Joseph’s fellow travelers in Bethlehem to be registered by Rome for the census. It was just another day in their lives.

And the Christ child comes for all of them in the story;

         He comes without regard to their position in life,

         He comes without regard to their beliefs and practices,

         He comes without regard for whether they deserved God’s love or not,

         He comes for His own purposes,

         He comes to take away their fears and lift their burdens,

         He comes to draw them to a life that’s really life.

And He comes for all of us here tonight, too in the stories, in the reality of our lives. He comes to let us know that we are all His and He loves us. He comes to you and to me tonight to take away our fears, to lift our burdens. He comes to offer you real life, life in all its abundance.

God Showing Love as We Show Love

Now, like most of you, I like to communicate my love in some outward way. It doesn’t really do much good to keep our love quiet or hidden away. People won’t know the depth of our feelings if we keep them to ourselves.  And so we communicate, we show our love for others.

Whether it’s a friend to a friend, a couple falling in love with one another, parent to a child, a child to a parent,  we want to communicate our love and the most common way is to say those three words, I love you.  Or to use some other words that let’s  those we love know that they are in our hearts.

But we also like to act in some way to show our love for another person. We offer our hand in friendship; we give a hug or a kiss, make a special dinner on a birthday; send a card or give a Christmas present. We spend time with people we love, listening and talking, and sometimes just being quiet together. If we have love in our hearts for another we become pretty good at finding physical ways to show our love for them so that they know they have our hearts in some tangible way.

And it’s the same for God. God wants to communicate and show His great love for us in words and deeds. God’s communicated His love in thousands of ways throughout history — through the wonder of creation and the gift of your life and mine; through words in the scriptures and through human representatives who have a word of God’s love for us.    But apparently the wonder of creation, the gift of life, the words weren’t enough for us to really know God’s I love you.

So God did something new, something surprising; something mysterious, something very physical.          God communicated His love for us by taking every ounce of that love every beautiful sunrise and sunset, every word of hope and promise and sent it to us in the most fragile and vulnerable of packages in the form of someone like us.

           

You see, Jesus Christ is nothing less than the full and physical communication of God’s I love you in word and in action for all people,  not merely for those who believe but for those of us who once believed and for those of us who have never believed or just aren’t sure. Whoever we are, whatever we believe, however we’re living our lives, God loves us and wants to communicate His love for our lives tonight and to give His love to you and me, just as we are, in our own lives. It’s what draws us to the manger, it’s what draws us here tonight. It is a love that we don’t deserve, that we can’t earn. And best of all, it is a love that we can’t lose, because it comes to us as gift from God, as the greatest of gifts for all people.

Receiving God’s Love

So whether you’re here tonight because you believe or because you want to believe again or because other purposes, not wholly your own, have drawn you to the manger. Remember that this story is your story, too, that the Lord of life who came that first Christmas night is here at our sides, beckoning us into a life with Him now offering us the gift of His love; and a life free from fear.

So now may God grant you the gift of the light of Christmas, which is faith. The gift of the belief of Christmas, which is hope; The gift of the warmth of Christmas, which is love; The gift of the radiance of Christmas, which is truth; The gift of the joy of Christmas, which is God; That there may be peace in your heart and over all the earth and good will for all in God’s love this night and every day throughout the year. 

Merry Christmas!