Hi everyone,

Welcome to worship for this Christmas Day, December 25, 2025!

The bulletin for this service can be found here. In it, you’ll find the order of worship, the words of the liturgy, and the sermon manuscript. You can follow along with the service with the bulletin or with the words on your screen, as most of the words you need to know will appear there. The sermon is also included on this page below the video.

If you’d like to enhance your online worship experience, you are welcome to have a lit candle in your space that can burn through the majority of the service and extinguished near the end, after the sending hymn. If you are comfortable, you are also welcome to participate in communion by having something small to eat and drink prepared for consumption. Further instruction will be given at the appropriate time.

May God’s unending presence with us fill you with joy and hope, this Christmas and always!

By the light of your Spirit, O God, may your Word illumine our hearts and minds, that we be open to your presence with and among us, through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

Finally, it’s Christmas.  Not just Christmas shopping or tree decorating.  Not just some kind of a Christmas concert or production.  Not Christmas Eve, as awesome as that was.  But Christmas.  Actual Christmas Day.  And I tell ya, I’ve been waiting for this day for a looong time now.  I mean, who doesn’t love Christmas, am I right?

But sure, I know that people in general are busy enough as it is, and Christmas adds to that and becomes an extra busy time.  And then if those people are parents or have bigger families that live locally, then it’s extra extra busy.  But then if those people are pastors, then honestly it gets extra extra extra busy.  And for pastors who are also parents and have large, locally-living families?  Well, that’s more “extras” than we have time for today, especially during this extra x infinity busy time.  But still, even with all those “extras”, this time of year continues to be a favourite for so many, myself included.

But something that kind of bothers me about Christmas time, especially this year, is that… well… and I mean this in the most polite way possible, but my goodness do people care whether or not my kids still get excited for Christmas or not.

Seriously, no offense to any of you who have asked me this, but it’s like the only thing people have to talk to me about these days.  It’s like become the opener to conversations after, “How are you.”  I get it, though.  My kids aren’t little kids anymore.  And with Christmas, much like all the other very commercialised holidays, cater heavily to little kids.  Or at least, works really hard to get the kids to fall into the consumerism mentality.  So losing those Christmas feels has become sort of a rite of passage, when the extra busyness of the world gets to us and sucks out the excitement, the joy, the magic of the season.  And it’s a shame when that happens to kids, because it’s that innocence and giddiness the kids have for Christmas that helps us to stay in that space.

So don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind that people ask me if my kids still get excited for Christmas per se, it’s just that… they don’t ask me if I get excited or not.  I mean, what about my feelings?  What about my giddiness of the season?  What about whether that magic affects me or not?

But I get that too, I guess, people would much rather talk about my kids than talk about me.  And that’s ok, I probably would want to talk about my kids more than myself as well.  But I just wonder about how it’s become “normal” to not get excited about this time of year.  Or not get caught up in the festivities.  Or just not… care about Christmas?

And honestly, it’s not hard to really get not excited about Christmas when we get texts like these, John’s version of Jesus’ birth.  You know, the one we just heard, the one that doesn’t have any shepherds or barn animals or “no vacancy” signs at the inn, you know, all the things we’ve come to expect from a Christmas story.  There aren’t any hosts of heaven, no unexpected reception, there isn’t even a baby John’s telling.  I mean it has images of the cosmos, but there’s no star.  It talks about the heavens, but there aren’t any angels.  And it’s mystical, but there’s no magic.

So this like the “mature” version.  This is the “grown up” story.  It’s full of head knowledge, cosmic language, and theology, not exactly kid-focussed.  I mean, there isn’t anyone out there who is making dioramas of John chapter 1.  There aren’t any stuffies or action figures of words transforming into flesh.  It’s just hard to get excited with what looks like the introduction to a 100-level course on the foundations of the earth’s formation.

So this, paired with all the stresses and busyness of life that I mentioned before, can be enough for us to get more excited for other things when we reach a certain age.  Things like pay raises or vacations.  New relationships or date nights for old ones.  Big events like the release of the teaser trailer for the new Avengers movie that is coming out next year.

And there’s nothing wrong with those things, they still are exciting and worthy to get us going a bit, especially the Avengers trailer.  And I don’t mean that Christmas should always be at the top of our minds all the time or even that we have to be excited about it.  I just wonder and am worried if the hecticness of this season has taken too much of a toll on us.  I’m concerned about whether or not the world’s interpretation of today has jaded us against its significance.  It just seems like life gets in the way a lot and we might lose sight of the real magic of Christmas.  Or maybe, Christmas got too familiar that it has faded into the background.

“He was in the world, and the world came into being through him, yet the world did not know him.”

Suddenly this hits different.  I mean the whole promise of Christmas is that God is with us, among our communities, in our relationships, throughout our very lives.  But I’m not sure if that truth gives us any hope anymore.  I don’t know if we feel led to peace.  It seems like the joy has waned.  And perhaps love has become reserved for only the lovable.

I’m not shaming anyone, mind you, I’m just talking about the state of the world as I’ve been seeing it.  It’s like the more the world says to itself that it doesn’t need God, all I can see is how much more it needs a Saviour.

A Saviour who understands.  A Saviour who knows the difficulties and distractions of life.  A Saviour who is one of us.

And as you guessed it, that’s what we get.  The story of Christmas reminds us of how God has entered into the world to be with us, as one of us, to save us.  That Jesus, the very embodiment of God’s nature, comes to us, remains with us, and holds us as we go through life’s struggles and stresses and reminds us of who we are and whose we are.

Essentially, all that God has done and continues to do, all that God is and continues to be, all that God has said and continues to proclaim, is incarnated in the person of Jesus.  That in him we can see all that God teaches us about relationships, humility, and forgiveness.  In him we can see all that God wants for us in terms of faith, service, and community.  In him we can see the very face of God, shining on us blessing, loving us into salvation, and just with us in every aspect of life.  Through and through.

I know, we don’t always see these truth in and around our lives and community.  We don’t always recognise the things that are from God and because of God.  We don’t always see Jesus, especially in these busy times that only seem to get busier.   But the promise of Christmas is that through the Holy Spirit, Jesus, God’s Word made flesh, is here among us, with us, giving us hope, guiding us to peace, generating joy in our communities, and granting to all this unending and unfaltering love that lifts us up out of everything that holds us back from seeing and believing in this promise.

So where can we see Jesus?  In the hope where there is no hope.  In the peace found where peace seems impossible.  In the joy bubbling up where joy has been lost.  And in the love in this world that seems to have turned into an endless vacuum of hatred, brokenness, and sin.

Jesus is here, in this vacuum, and reminds us that throughout all of life, that we are worth it.

My friends, this is why I still get excited for Christmas.  This is where the magic of Christmas remains for me.  This is what Christmas is all about, reminding us of who we are, showing us God through Jesus by the power of the Spirit in our lives, and revealing to us all hope, peace, joy, and love, that is graciously declared to us as children of God.

So on this Christmas Day, throughout this Christmas season, and for the whole year and all time, may we constantly see the face of God in our lives, through the Word made flesh, by the ebbing and flowing of the Spirit in and around us, that leads us into the life that truly is life.  Thanks be to God.  Amen.