Christmas Eve Service

A little child, a shining star, a stable rude, the door ajar.

Yet in that place so crude, forlorn, the Hope of all the world was born.

Hymn 92 - O Little Town of Bethlehem

Prayer

Scripture

Isaiah 7:14 Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.

Isaiah 9:6 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.

Isaiah 9:7 Of the increase 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.

Micah 5:2 “But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times.”

Malachi 3:1 “See, I will send my messenger, who will prepare the way before me. Then suddenly the Lord you are seeking will come to his temple; the messenger of the covenant, whom you desire, will come,” says the LORD Almighty.

Hymn 84 - Come Thou Long Expected Jesus

Poem:

Just another baby boy born in Bethlehem town.

One more hungry mouth to feed, and so the world slept on.

It was a weary captive world gripped tight in Rome’s domain.

The chilling fear of tyranny fast held them like a chain.

Another baby, more or less, what difference could he be?

One more soul to bear the pain and share their misery.

So passed mankind a winter’s night, those beaten down by sin.

Too dull to hear angelic strains that rose above the din.

Near two millennia have passed since God took human frame.

The world runs its appointed course, but nevermore the same.

He gathered up the captive’s chain once forged for you and me.

He broke the foul tyrant’s grasp and purchased liberty.

Now looms above the manger bed a message for all men:

He died, He lives, He intercedes, He’s coming back again!

Then heralded forth the joyous word our voices lift as one.

The babe who slept in cattle stall is God’s triumphant Son.

Hymn 94 - What Child is This?

Scripture: Isaiah 53:1-6

Who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? 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.

He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted.

But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

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Almost 2,000 years ago there was a man born contrary to the laws of life. This man lived in poverty and was reared in obscurity. He did not travel extensively. Only once did he cross the border of the country in which he lived, and that was during his exile in childhood.

He possessed neither wealth nor influence. His relatives were inconspicuous and had no training or formal education. As an infant, he startled a king. As a child, he puzzled the learned doctors of the law. In his manhood, he ruled the course of nature. He walked upon the waves as if they were pavement, and he hushed the sea to sleep. He healed the multitudes without medicine and made no charge for his services.

He never wrote a book, yet all the libraries of the world could not hold the books that have been written about him. He never wrote a song, and yet he has furnished the theme for more songs than all the songwriters combined.

He never founded a college, but all the great universities put together cannot boast of having as many students. He never marshaled an army, nor drafted a soldier, nor fired a gun, and yet no leader has had more volunteers who have, under his orders, made more rebels stack arms and surrender without a shot being fired.

He never practiced psychiatry, and yet he has healed more broken hearts than all the doctors far and near.

The names of the past proud statesmen of Greece and Rome have come and gone. The names of the great scientists, philosophers, and theologians have come and gone; but the name of this man abounds more and more.

Though time has spread almost two thousand years between the people of this generation and the scene of his crucifixion, yet he still lives. Herod could not destroy him. The grave could not hold him.

All the armies that ever marched, all the navies that ever were built, all the parliaments that ever sat and all the kings that ever reigned, put together, have not affected the life of man on this earth as powerfully as has that one solitary life.

We number our calendars according to his date of birth. We call the first day of the week the Lord’s Day in honor of him. In our courts of law, we have witnesses swear on the book that he inspired. The cross on which he died can be seen over the skyline of cities on every continent of the world. That symbol is worn around the neck, or reverently displayed in the homes of people in every country of the world. Today, almost 2,000 years after he was born, the life of Jesus Christ has an enormous impact on our world.

But did you know that his life had an impact 2,000 years before he was born? From our vantage point, in the year 1991, we look back at Jesus. But up to four thousand years ago, there were people who were looking forward to him.

We have read some of the Old Testament Scriptures which speak of the coming Messiah. There are many more which we could have read - Scriptures which speak of a great redeemer who would come and set things right.

You see, if you read the Bible from the beginning, you only have to get to the third page before you realize that something has gone terribly wrong. Man, created to dwell in a paradise, chose instead to turn his back on God. The whole of human history because of that fateful choice has been a tragedy. Listen to how C.S. Lewis describes it…

What Satan put into the heads of our remote ancestors was the idea that they could be like gods - could set up on their own as if they had created themselves - be their own masters - invent some sort of happiness for themselves outside God, apart from God. And out of that hopeless attempt has come nearly all that we call human history - money, poverty, ambition, war, prostitution, classes, empires, slavery - the long terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy.

A hopeless situation, or so it seemed, until God intervened. The way he intervened was to select a particular man who lived in Mesopotamia about the year 2000 BC - a man named Abraham. He took Abraham out of his homeland to a land that he had promised to him. God gave Abraham another great promise: that he would become the father of a nation, and that that nation would bring blessing to the whole earth.

That, of course, was the origin of the nation Israel - the only nation on earth who can trace their racial origin to an individual person. Now over the next several hundred years, God hammered into the nation Israel the concept that there was only one God, and that he was holy and righteous. All the other nations around Israel worshiped many gods, and the moral system that they patterned on the behavior of those gods was something less than noble.

But during the course of Israel’s history, God used spokesmen - we call them prophets - to begin to introduce the idea that Israel was someday going to be visited by an extraordinary person. This person would be no ordinary man - there are hints that he would be God himself.

This person, who they called the Messiah - the anointed one - would address the fact that man was separated from God. He would serve as a reconciler, to bring us back to God.

Thus, we have a man like Moses who lived around the year 1400 BC. He spoke about one who was coming who would be the seed of the woman and who would crush the serpent’s head. It was Moses who told us about Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and how Jacob told his son Judah that the one who would wield the royal scepter would come from his people, from his tribe.

It was Moses who taught us that man’s sin needed a substitute - an innocent victim to die in man’s place; to cover over his sin and guilt in the sight of God. The whole sacrificial system that Moses described foreshadowed an even greater sacrifice that needed to be made.

Then we have King David, who lived around the year 1000 BC. It was David who told us in the Second Psalm that God would call the Messiah His Son. It was to David that God gave the promise that from his line the Messiah would come.

Isaiah, a prophet who lived around the year 700 BC, spoke of the Messiah being born of a virgin, and of him being called Immanuel, which means “God with us.” He said “Unto us a child is born; unto us a son is given. And the government shall be upon his shoulders. And his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace.”

Micah, a prophet who lived at the same time as Isaiah, proclaimed that out of Bethlehem, one of the smallest towns in Judah, would come forth one who would be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, even from everlasting.

Jeremiah, another great prophet who lived around the year 600 BC, wrote about a new covenant that God would make with his people; a covenant that would be fulfilled through the Messiah.

Daniel, who lived in 550 BC, wrote of the Anointed One, who would be the centerpiece of history. He wrote about the Son of Man who would come with the clouds of heaven and who would be given authority, glory and sovereign power; all peoples, nations and men of every language would worship him.

It was Zechariah, a prophet who lived around the year 500 BC, who wrote that the Messiah would come to Israel mounted on a donkey, even on a colt the foal of a donkey, but that he would be sold to his enemies for 30 pieces of silver. Zechariah predicted that this blood money would be thrown down in the House of the Lord and that the money would be used to buy a potter’s field. He was speaking of the events surrounding Palm Sunday and Judas Iscariot’s betrayal of Jesus.

Malachi, a prophet who lived about the year 400 BC, wrote of a great forerunner who would come in the spirit and power of Elijah to prepare the way of the Lord.

So you see, Jesus’ birth was creating quite a stir for hundreds of years before it happened. Because Jesus Christ is the centerpiece of human history - he is the central character of the plot. He came to be the Savior of the world. That’s why we celebrate Christmas.

Underneath your Christmas tree right now, I’m sure, are many presents. By tomorrow at noon, I would venture to say, they will be all gone. You will have unwrapped them and you’ll be enjoying them. That’s what presents are for.

But I want you to imagine that under your Christmas tree one present is left. It is a very beautiful gift, carefully chosen and wrapped by someone who loves you very much. It cost a great deal for him to purchase - in fact it cost him everything. But it is still sitting there at the end of Christmas day - all alone under a Christmas tree that is beginning to look a little bedraggled. You just leave it there, ignored, as the days go by.

Finally, with the holidays over, you decide to take down the tree and the ornaments and the lights. After putting them all away for another year, all that is left in your living room is that one beautiful present. It’s covered with pine needles now. It looks out of place, now that all the decorations are gone, so you pick it up and stash it behind the sofa, where it will be out of the way.

Every now and then, when company comes over, you show them the beautiful gift stashed behind the sofa, and everyone admires the lovely wrapping paper and the exquisite bow. But the parcel remains there, unopened, ignored, and eventually forgotten.

Can you see what I am getting at? That is how most people treat Jesus Christ at Christmas. That gift is the gift of salvation that Jesus purchased with his own blood. He wants you to have it, he wants you to open it, to enjoy it. That’s why he came here to earth. That was the reason for his mission.

But most people ignore the gift. Oh, they pay lip service to how wonderful the gift looks, they even sing about it, but they don’t open it. They don’t receive it for themselves. Jesus Christ becomes one of the props of Christmas, along with Santa and his reindeer, and Frosty the Snowman, instead of being the central figure.

How do you think that makes him feel?

My prayer for you this Christmas is that you’ll open the gift; that you’ll discover just how much God loves you; that you’ll receive the gift, and thank God for it.

A little child, a shining star, a stable rude, the door ajar.

Yet in that place so crude, forlorn, the Savior of the world was born.

But a Savior who is left under wraps can be no Savior at all.