Category: Advent – Christmas

I wrote this column a few years ago for my colleagues (and anyone else who wanted to “listen in”).  Here it is back by popular request.

Most churches experience bigger crowds at Christmas or Easter than during the normal course of the year. In the churches that I have served in the past, the church was always full on Christmas Eve, sometimes to overflowing.  In fact many churches have multiple services on Christmas Eve to accommodate the crowds. That would make Christmas Eve even more popular than Easter Sunday  The question is, how do we treat the people that cause our congregations to swell for the holidays?  Some preachers are tempted  (and a few succumb to the temptation) to take advantage of a captive audience.  So over the years of doing Christmas sermons, I have learned what to say and what NOT to say. So let me begin with the “Thou Shalt Not’s” for preachers on Christmas Eve.

1. THOU SHALT NOT belittle or make fun of “The Christmas and Easter Crowd”.  Yes, it is true that there are people who never darken the door of a church except perhaps on those days, and many of those are there under duress – they came in order to keep peace in their family and to avoid being nagged by the holier than thou relatives.  Do you think you are in any way helpful by making a snide remark about how your church is open all the rest of the year?  Of course you wish they would come back more often, but the way to entice them is to make the service so wonderful that they will think of it themselves, “hey this isn’t so bad!  In fact I rather like it!  Maybe I could try it again some time).  But guilt tripping or shaming them will not motivate them to be back.
2. THOU SHALT NOT RANT OR RAVE  about the commercialization of Christmas, the hectic activities of the season or for that matter any other subject. Rants are seldom if ever appropriate in the pulpit, but a preacher who gives one at Christmas, has in my opinion, totally failed his or her calling. Yes, everyone knows about how secular and devoid of spiritual meaning Christmas has become in our world. But haven’t you got something more wonderful than that to speak about at Christmas?  How about, “For unto you is born this day a Saviour” ? I want to illustrate this point with a personal experience.  In the church that I grew up in, the Christmas Eve service always began at dusk, so that most of the evening was free for the family celebration that occurs in German families on Christmas Eve.  This meant that it was sometimes difficult to get to the service on time as shops were closing and people were hurrying home from work.  I remember one particular Christmas Eve when our pastor scolded the many late-comers, and angrily talked about how senseless the whole Christmas  razzle-dazzle  was.  I was maybe 12 years old, and could not figure out why the pastor was so angry on Christmas Eve!  Now, more than 60 years later, is it any surprise that this is ALL that I can remember about that particular service?
3. THOU SHALT NOT TRIFLE WITH NON-ESSENTIAL TRIVIA.  The people sitting in front of you, whether they are faithful attendees or once a year visitors do not care that Jesus was not born on December 25, and that the date for Christmas was fixed by a pope who tried to syncretize a pagan celebration with the birth of Christ.  Nor do they care that the angelic host did not sing but rather “spoke” their gloria in excelsis (see Luke 2:13), nor that we don’t really know how many magi there were, and that they were certainly not “3 Kings of Orient”.  If you think that these details are important to know, then perhaps a Bible study group or a Sunday teaching message on another occasion might be a more appropriate forum to wax eloquent on such gems.  But in the main Christmas services, people come for a variety of reasons: looking for hope, looking to be inspired, longing to have their hearts stirred in worship.  Don’t send them out empty.  Don’t reduce Christmas to a game of trivia.
4. THOU SHALT NOT FORGET THOSE WHO FIND CHRISTMAS DIFFICULT.  Among your listeners will be people for whom this will be the first Christmas without a loved one whom they lost in the previous year.  Whether it was by death or divorce, or some other loss, they may be emotionally raw.  Or perhaps the loss didn’t happen this year, but it happened long ago at Christmas, and so each year there is a difficult surge of memories.  How do you help such people?  For one thing, don’t ignore them.  On the other hand, don’t rub salt into their wound by singling them out or dwelling on heartache and pain.  A thoughtful gesture might be to refer to all such people in one of the prayers in the service (not by name).  Or a brief word as you give them a special greeting as you shake their hand at the door or a hug if you are the hugging type.

All right then, what SHOULD I preach about at Christmas?  I think the answer to that can best be answered in the words of the hymn writer, Tell me the old, old story. I particularly like the line in the first verse that says, tell me the story simply, as to a little child.  While it may enthral you to wax eloquent on the theological implications of God’s incarnation,  many of those who need to hear the Good News will not understand your ruminations. I recall sitting in the audience of a Christmas service years ago where the man in the pulpit preached on a text from Romans about the doctrine of justification.  He talked about how the cross was more important than the cradle, and his sermon was riddled with terms like Jesus’ blood being shed for our sins.  I felt like giving him a calendar for Christmas.

I have heard preachers complain that they find it hard to find exciting ways to talk about Christmas after doing it for so many years, particularly if you are in the same congregation for a number of years.  I have to say that I don’t understand that.  I have been doing Christmas sermons for well over 40 years, and I have yet to run out of material. While I still have manuscripts of my early efforts, I rarely if ever “dip into the barrel”.   Each year, I immerse myself in the Christmas story in Matthew and Luke’s gospels, and I always find something that is new in that old, old story.  Tell them about the Savior, tell them about the Joy that the new-born King brings and show them how even their own life can be changed by believing that message.  There aren’t enough Christmases to exhaust that message.

In my living room is an Advent wreath. It is a suspended from a table-top stand made by my father.  In years past the red ribbons suspended a wreath made of genuine evergreen branches.  The red candles would be lit beginning on the first Sunday of Advent, with one more on each of the four Sundays of Advent. As kids the Advent wreath fascinated us. It was a count down until Christmas, and the more candles were burning, the closer the big day was. I can remember that as a family we would sing “Advent” carols (not Christmas carols!) – at least not until the fourth Sunday.  This was all done in German, and the Advent carols came from a songbook called the “Singvögelein” (song bird) which was the songbook we used in Sunday School.

Advent means “Arrival”.  As kids the arrival that concerned us was Dec 24 and 25. As we matured, we learned that the Advent season represented the waiting time for Messiah’s appearance, and is a time of preparation for the celebration of the incarnation.  Since we live in New Testament times, Advent also reminds us of Jesus’ Second Coming, not as a babe in the manger, but in power and glory, and that we must be prepared for that event.

As kids we also each received an Advent calendar.  It had 24 doors on it, one for each day starting December 1.  Behind the door, when it was opened, a Bible verse, or a picture (or nowadays chocolate!) would be visible.  The door that was marked “24” was usually a double door behind which the nativity scene was visible.

In early church history, in other words in pre-reformation times, Advent was a solemn time of fasting and spiritual examination.  The fast was in anticipation of the feasting that took place at Christmas time.

Evangelical Christians have generally not paid much attention to Advent, but fortunately, that is changing.  In the church that I attend, we light an Advent candle on each Sunday of Advent.  I was glad to note that one of our pastors gave us an explanation of the meaning of Advent, as well as the meaning of that particular Sunday, as the Advent Sundays represent Hope–Peace–Joy–Love respectively.  Some churches change that order.  In liturgical churches each candle has a distinctive colour, although red is the choice of colour for some.  In our church the candles are blue.  I’m not sure why that colour was chosen, but blue does happen to be the new liturgical colour for Advent, to distinguish it from the purple or violet of lent.  Usually there is a somewhat larger white candle in the middle, which is lit either Christmas Eve, or Christmas Day.

As one raised in the free-church tradition, I never felt a need to be bound to the rigours of the liturgical calendar.  In other words rather than be restricted to preaching about the meaning of each particular Sunday, I felt free to preach whatever Scripture I was inspired to choose for a particular Sunday.  However the calendar is not without usefulness.  Observing Advent for example, helps me to build in my own life the joy of celebrating the Birth of Christ. The same applies to lent, the weeks that lead up to Easter.

At a time when Christmas music surrounds us from mid November, it might be useful to learn to anticipate and hope once again. In our home in which i grew up, the Christmas tree did not appear until about December 23 or so. We also did not throw it out to the curb on December 26 like many still do. It stayed up until mid January, or at least until the feast of the Epiphany was over.

Whatever your tradition might be, for today I will say Happy Advent.  But not yet Merry Christmas.  That comes later.