This night is Christmas Eve and our church family will be celebrating with choir singing and children testifying to the story of Jesus' birth in front of friends, family and strangers. This night we'll close the service like we do every year with ushers passing out candles, silent prayers that the church doesn't burn down and thankfulness that the fire station is across the street! Candles are lit, one off the other and the lights are turned off and while candles glow we sing "Silent Night".
This night a battle has been waged and won for you. Love had to come back for you. Love had to get to you. The Love that has been coming for you since the beginning - He slays dragons for you. This is the truest love store of history, and it's His-Story, and it's for you. All the other fairy-tale love stories only echo your yearning for this truest, realest one - this one that has its beginning before the beginning of time. This night, you on this visited planet, your rescue is here. You can breathe. (245)
He lays Himself down in your mire.
He unfolds Himself in the stench you want to hide, in that mess that is your impossible, in the mucked straw you don't want anyone to know.
Rejected at the inn, holy God comes in small to where you feel rejected and small. God is with you now. Wherever you are - in a soundless cry or hidden brokenness or in your ache - God always wants to be with you. You are not ever left alone in this. We are never left alone in this; God is with us. (246)
At home we put the final nativity figures on the Advent picture made of felt and attached with velcro. We, the manger tramps, who kneel where thrones tremble and demons fall and the self-made crumble and the self-righteous weep.
Tonight there are only manger tramps, who tramp in with all our poverty of spirit … so there can be an abundance of God. (247)
We lay the final piece into the nativity - a baby.
The greatest Gift laid into our empty hands … (248)
Silent night, holy night …
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