Christmas Eve 2025

Transcript is automatically produced. Errors may be present.

Merry Christmas friends, Mer. Merry Christmas. My name’s Alex. I get the privilege of pastoring the community of South.

If you are visiting on this Christmas you’re so welcome. We’re so glad that you’re here. Joining us, it’s one of the highlights of the calendar, this beautiful moment where we get to recognize in a few moments I’ll light this, the Christ candle, the white one in the middle, and it’s this moment where we recognize.

That God is with us. Although I’ve noticed not everyone thinks that we’re here for the same reason. One of my kids who right now will bere remain nameless ’cause they’re somewhere hidden. Said we were here for a cookie party. Which. Seems fair too. But I wanted to say that just in case, ’cause there’s kid’s in the room, any of you were bought here under false pretenses.

And if you were, I sincerely apologize and I will talk for just a small amount of time and what I’ll do is I’ll try and lace together some of the themes to draw out some of the ideas that we’ve sung about. And that we’ve heard read to us to try and make sure that we go away from Christmas with this sense of what is the most central thing to it.

For those of you that have been at South throughout the season, we call Advent, the season before Christmas, you’ll have heard a lot of this first little part already and that’s okay. It’s a good reminder but I wanna make sure everyone. Is up to speed because for the church, the Christmas season, as it probably should it starts in the dark.

We heard the haunting words, the words of in the bleak mid winter the maybe is on the list for gloomiest of Christmas carols. It’s here somewhere in the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan. Earth stood hard as iron water like a stone. Snow had fallen snow on snow. Snow on snow in the bl bleak mid winter long ago.

It’s a song that you might listen to in a very contemplative space. Maybe you’re someone who loves to stay up late after everyone else has gone to bed. Maybe you like to sit and think about things, maybe stare at a Christmas tree, maybe enjoy a glass of wine. It’s your vision. I don’t know, you. You get to decide and maybe if you’re doing that, you start thinking about Christmas, past Christmas, present Christmas future, you end up in those contemplated spaces.

Just a warning. If you’re doing that, three ghosts appear to you. It means you’ve been doing Christmas badly. And so maybe rethink. Be prepared for that. But maybe that’s not your wiring. Maybe you’re not someone who tends to operate in those spaces may maybe you find that space awkward. And so we sing that song and maybe you are someone who’s can we get back to Joy to the world?

Can we hit the high notes? But I suspect at Christmas in this season we actually need both of those ideas. We need the idea of waiting and recognizing that maybe some of the spaces we wait for guardian are uncomfortable spaces. We’ll look at one of those contexts in a moment, but then we also need the joy, the recognition that Christmas is here, that Jesus has come.

There’s a passage, I’m gonna read a few verses from, it’s written by a guy called Isaiah. He lived about 700 years before Jesus. Was born, but he wrote about Jesus. It’s a passage written to people that lived in the dark who have no hope, and yet it is a hopeful passage of scripture. It’s a passage full of hope written to those that have no hope.

Here it is on the screen. Nine verse one. Nevertheless, there will be no more gloom for those who are in distress. Maybe another way of saying that there will be no darkness for those in trouble. The people walking in darkness. Have seen a great light and those living in the land of deep darkness, a light has dawned.

That’s the image I want you to hold on for just a second. Out of the midst of darkness, light suddenly appears out of nowhere, and maybe darkness is easier for us to begin with than bleak midwinter, although we’ll get to more of that. Carol. Bleak. Mid winter might be hard right now. It’s 70 degrees outside.

It’s hardly winter. And as for Snow on snow, veil Mountain would say we have not experienced that for at least a year. It’s a difficult spot. Darkness. Is the idea then we’ll work with. This is JRR Tolkien writing in his brilliant poetic form about the idea of darkness. He says this, it cannot be seen, cannot be felt, cannot be heard, cannot be smelled.

It lies behind stars and underhill and empty holes It fills. It comes first, follows after ends. Life kills laughter. That is how you might describe the people that first heard Isaiah speak. People, a place where laughter had ended, people that needed new hope, laughter for them was gone. Darkness, even just physical darkness works on us in a strange way.

My parents own a very English garden, a very English garden owned by two very English people, Nigel and Angeline. It just sounds English. You walk outside and it seems like just a small plot of ground, a little patio, a courtyard with flowers dotted around it, but then past a giant oak tree, maybe a hundred and.

10 feet tall, maybe 150 years old. The garden suddenly opens out. It suddenly becomes this beautiful space of green place of flowers, yes, of trees, unlooked, surrounded by big, tall trees of long years, place of family, of laughter, a place people come to and long to return to again. I wrote a little text to Laura when I was there last year.

Oh my goodness. I’m sad on the swing and the sun and apple blossoms are just casually falling around me. There are birds everywhere. A bumblebee just landed on my knee. I actually write stuff like that. I don’t know if that’s just me or it’s an everyone thing, but I just love those kind of spaces and yet.

Years ago when revising for exams, I used to work down in the room at the bottom of that garden. I’d work deep into the night and then become the moment I needed to switch the lights off and walk up to the house, and I walked out into a garden, changed. I no longer light and fun and full of joy. Suddenly, every shadow seemed to mean something.

Every sound grabbed my attention. I looked behind every tree to make sure no one was hiding there waiting. I had an overactive imagination. It happens to 25 year olds every now and again. I was, a little older than maybe you thought when I told that story. But it was a strange change to experience.

Now that’s just physical darkness. Imagine a land that has spiritual darkness. People, as I said, who don’t laugh, have no hope for the future. The nation of Israel had the most powerful nation of its time sweep in it. It had taken people captive and moved them to towns all over the place. It had brought other people into that place to live.

All relationships were gone, friendships were gone. All history. It’s gone now. I know what you might be saying. That’s enough of the darkness. I came for Christmas Eve. Yes, I agree. But we have to start here because otherwise what comes next doesn’t feel like it matters at all. The good news comes next.

The darkness is passing away.

Did you feel how the Carol shifted? It went from one space Earth, the bleakness winter, those pieces of language that we stopped and paused on, and now it’s changed. It suddenly moves upwards. It’s now not about Earth at all. It’s about God and where goddess, the darkness is passing away. And now the true light is beginning.

To shine. Christmas is fast approaching our God. Heaven cannot hold him. It says, nor earth sustain. It captures these big images of who God is, heaven and earth flee away when he comes to rain, it pictures God as beyond what is happening here on earth beyond it, but not uninterested in it. Jesus brother James becomes one of the first writers in the New Testament.

I know what you’re thinking. Strange, right? For a brother of someone to ever come to believe they might be divine, it took Jesus resurrection to convince him. And I have two brothers and I’m not sure resurrection would convince me that they were divine, but James is on board, which is good. He says this the father of Heavenly Lights who does not change.

Like shifting shadows to him. God is the one who is light, the one who gives good gifts. James wants you to know that if you have received something good this year, if you have received something valuable, if you sit with life and say, this has been good to me, you have someone to thank for it and that, that’s actually a beautiful gift to be able.

To be grateful when Jesus comes into the scene. God, in human flesh, it says in him wass life and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it. These the images that were given at the start of this second verse, and then feel how it changes and feel how it ties with what Todd read us earlier as suddenly we hear that the light of the world has come.

But into spaces we wouldn’t expect him in. The bleak midwinter, a stable place Sufficed the Lord God Almighty, Jesus Christ, a stable. Think about that again, as though it’s a new idea, not one you’ve heard as many years as you may have been alive. Do we expect to find God in stables? This is the Luke Passage chapter two.

They were, their time came for the baby to be born and she gave birth to her first Borner son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger because there was no guest room available for them. Stable. It’s an odd place. To be. I grabbed a picture of a generic nativity stable It looks like unlike any other stable A FC in my life, it looks like the straw was made.

Today. There are no animals whatsoever in sight. There’s gold floating in the air. All of these different kind of tropes that we get at this time of year. When I was a kid, my aunt was a farmer and we used to go and spend the summer with her. We would be in and out of cow sheds. This does not look like it smells like any cow shed that I ever went in.

In this time. This look looks like it smells like Chanel number five or Bachar Rat Rouge or some high-end perfume. It doesn’t look like it fits with what the scene actually was. Maybe the idea is now so over familiar to us. We have to sanitize it. Just a little bit. We have to take this idea and tweak it just a bit so we can handle the idea that God was found in a stable at this time of year.

’cause to know the truth, it’s actually harder than we might think. Stable probably. SMT terrible cows don’t go where they’re supposed to. They find themselves in unusual spaces. It doesn’t feel like you imagine God’s arrival might feel, but this is the light of the world. It’s tiny right now. It’s almost not yet happened.

It’s the tiniest spark of light that will slowly spread across the world. Everything has changed, but almost nobody knows it yet. C. S Lewis describes this kind of experience like this. I expect you have seen someone put a lighted match to a bit of newspaper, which is propped up in a gr against an unlit fire.

And for a second, nothing seems to have happened. And then you notice a tiny streak of flame creeping along the edge of the newspaper. It was like that. Now, that is what it means for God to be here. It’s a news that’s about to spread everywhere. This is Brujas painting. It’s called the Census. That nativity, he takes the story of Mary and Joseph traveling to Bethlehem and places it in what he knew, a 16th century.

Village, but it doesn’t work. Like most paintings work. Most paintings of this era have a hero shot. It centers on a couple of figures, you know instantly who they are by what’s going on. This doesn’t center on anyone. There’s 200 individual characters in this painting. Mary and Joseph are there, but you might miss them.

It’s like, where’s Waldo for Christmas? Have a look and see what do you see them

or are they lost in the busyness of what’s going on? People go on with our everyday lives, it seems there’s a crowd that are trying to buy something at an inn or perhaps fill out their names in a census as people killing a pig to cook. As people. Ice skating, great-great-great-great grandfathers of the people that founded the Color Colorado Avalanche, I understand all these sort of people dodi it around people building a house and one guy who’s clearly been on the naughty list and has been made to stand against a wall.

An odd edition. All these different scenes, bruja adds for some reason. But did you find Mary. And did you find Joseph? They’re there right at the very front, but so missable. So missable. Isn’t that what the real heart of Christmas is? Missable. It’s missable in the painting. Too much going on. It’s permissible here.

Too much going on. I don’t miss Christmas for the reasons as they do, or the heartbeat. I miss it ’cause I’m busy with family, with friends. I’m busy ’cause I love all of the things that go into Christmas. I’m busy ’cause I work in a church and I work for God and sometimes miss him all together. That’s what happens at Christmas and that’s why we pause and we notice the darkness.

Has passed, the true light is already shining.

A final thought for you, and then we’re gonna come to this moment that for me. Is one of the highlights of my year. It’s been the highlight of my year every year since I first discovered that churches at Christmas lit candles sometimes and sang silent Night together. There’s something about this pause I just remember.

The thing I’d like to focus on for just a couple more minutes is how do we respond to that idea that perhaps we miss Jesus in the midst of Christmas, Christ in the middle of his own festival? Couple of thoughts for you. We can pay attention to those that don’t miss him. There’s a couple of characters that come into that.

Carol, in the final verse, right? Shepherds. And the Maggy. Sometimes as the known the kings on the surface, they don’t seem to have anything in common. The shepherds are introduced. In verse eight, we heard them and there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, watching, keeping watch over their flocks.

At night, an angel of the Lord appeared to them and they, the glory of the Lord shun around them. They were terrified. But the angel said to them, do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David, a savior has been born to you. He’s the Messiah, the Lord.

This will be a sign to you. You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger. The maggi come in Matthew in chapter two after Jesus was born in Bethlehem and Judah. During the time of King Herod, magi from the East came to Jerusalem and asked, where is the one who is to be born king of the Jews?

We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him surface. The stories are, as I say, are not common. Some local people, probably the lowest class in society, some of the poorest people, some very wealthy people from out of town. One travels just a short distance. One travels. Tons and mil, hundreds, thousands of miles.

One seems to have this supernatural experience that can’t be missed. One has to pay very attention, very careful attention to star movements. What do they have in common? I think it’s this. I think they have in common that they’re willing to notice God in the unusual spaces. You might say like this, they’re willing to see Christ in the common.

Several years ago, I was in the nation of Haiti, a super deprived place. I’d been there multiple times in quick succession, was starting to resent the constant travel. The groups I was taking were having incredible experience, but if I was honest, I was fed up of being there. It’d just been enough.

Most of the time when I was there, my heart would get turned around. But this time it hadn’t yet. It was a new group. We were working with a new church that just had enough. Then a group of Haitian boys said to me, would you come play soccer with us? There was about a hundred of us in a room. About half, maybe a quarter of the size of this room, just a dirt floor with a roof over the top.

The soccer ball flew around like crazy. You got to hold onto it for about a second before you had a pile of Haitian kids jump on top of you. It was sweaty, it was smelly. All the things that stable might have been in real life, and yet there was this moment where I paused and I noticed hadn’t experienced God like this in a long time.

It seems that’s what God does. He shows up in unusual spaces, but there’s one other thing both of these groups seem to be able to do. Perhaps it’s a faith thing, perhaps it’s just some knowledge that’s passed to them, but they don’t just see Jesus the baby. Remember the Talladega night scene, the one that’s become famous now, the whole, I prefer the baby Jesus scene.

The person who sits and prays and says, okay, dear, eight pounds, six ounce newborn infant, Jesus. Don’t even say a word yet. Just a little infant. So cuddly, but still omnipotent. We just thank you for all the races I’ve won. It’s actually easy to do this. That’s what makes it funny to me. Sure it’s funny for lots of other reasons, but the truth is it’s easy to keep Jesus as a baby.

It’s not very dangerous there at all. But the beauty of this story is its beginning and how it continues. It starts as C. S Lewis said, as this light deposited in the midst of the world, that light grows. It spreads to each of us in the room. It spreads all over this world and did for the first 200 years and the next 2000 years.

That’s the incredible nature of the Jesus story. We get a little mirror of that when we light these candles in just a moment. We pause and we contemplate and we watch as this little flame dots from me to the people here down the front, and they turn and they pass it to you. And as we sing Silent Night together, we watch as it spreads throughout the room.

That’s the Jesus story. He doesn’t stay a baby in a manger. He grows up to be a king. This is the end of the Isaiah passage for a to us. A child is born to us as son is given. The government will be on his shoulders. He will be called wonderful counselor. Mighty God, everlasting Father, prince of peace, of the greatness of his government and peace.

There will be no end. It’s not a baby in a manger anymore. He’s a king who rules over a people. We get at Christmas to do what the Carol suggests. Our response might be, we get to decide am I willing to surrender my kingdom to his kingdom? You all surprisingly have a kingdom. You have the things that you control, the things you have influence over.

It seems like following Jesus is more than just believing a baby was born. It means surrendering what you have to him. That’s other Carol lens. Yet what can I give? I give my heart. Maybe you follow Jesus for 80, 90 years. Maybe you never have. The call at Christmas is not just to celebrate a birth, but to follow a savior.

That’s what we’re asked to remember. And so here’s my prayer for each of you as we get ready for this part, which I know kids you’re so excited about, may the light of Christ shine on you this Christmas.

I love how that incredible piece of music starts with this sense of waiting. And then the end almost feels like arriving at home. It takes a light metaphor and turns it into one that’s inviting and to find our home in God where we belong.

In a moment, I’m gonna light this candle. There’s a couple of things I get to say beforehand. This is the only time of year we allow children to play with fire in church. We should probably check our insurance policy handles that when you take the candle. You hold it like this when it’s lit, the person holding it keeps theirs upright and the person lighting it.

They turn their sideways like that, and then you don’t tip light on the ground for whatever else that you might tip on the ground. Take a moment. Maybe you have an image from this year, something you’re grateful for. Maybe surrounded by people you’re grateful for in this room. Maybe you’ll be with them at dinner tomorrow.

The father of light who gives good gifts, maybe take a moment to be thankful. Maybe it’s been a terrible year, just hard and heavy. Maybe have questions about what tomorrow will look like. Next year will look like. And the beautiful gift is that the light of God shines brightest in the moments that are darkest

and the light of the world is here.

I am gonna light this candle and pass it to those near the front, and it’ll come back to you, but we’ll wait for you. For Silent Night.