Tag Archives: Christmas

Christmas and Communion

At our church, the first Sunday of the month is Communion Sunday. Today it just felt like a great way to kick off the Christmas Season.

I also had the opportunity to lead worship this morning. We sang a couple of carols, and then built off of “O Come, All Ye Faithful” all the way to “Here I Am To Worship.” It was sort of going from Jesus’ birth to death all in 20 minutes.

Of course, Jesus’ death and resurrection are the point behind Jesus’ birth. If Jesus had just been a prophet or important man, but was unable to satisfy the requirements of the perfect sacrifice, we wouldn’t have much to celebrate. We don’t celebrate the birth of Abraham, Moses or David. We don’t all get together on Barack Obama’s or Stephen Harper’s or Queen Elizabeth’s birthday. We don’t put out lights and decorations for President’s Day in February (at least, not yet).

If weren’t for Christ’s body broken for you, and Christ’s blood shed for you, this time of year might not be much of a celebration at all.

Worship at Christmastime

We have crossed into December, and the countdown to Christmas is officially underway in our house. Our tree was standing for over a week without ornaments until last night. It’s a prelit tree, but it looked a little odd with the middle section blacked out for several nights in a row. That’s one of the issues you run into when you have a lot of ornaments that plug in. Last night we finally added the ornaments.

My wife has found time to add little things all around the house. She bought some new LED candlelights online for each of the windows. Some faux brick cardboard lines the walls of a sitting room, trimmed neatly with puffy white “snow” and all of our stockings. And we hung some paper snowflakes from the kitchen ceiling.

This Sunday, though, I get to do something I rarely have the opportunity to anymore: lead worship. It probably seems silly that a guy who wrote a book on worship suddenly finds himself out of the role. But part of the role I do fill now, as assistant pastor, requires filling in where other needs are, since we have a number of worship leaders in the church.

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