Lifebridge Church Blog

Christmas is when you pull out all the stops.  The decorations, the lights, the music . . . whatever it takes to capture the “magical Christmas feel” that we all so crave.  For me, that moment always came at the end of the Christmas service, when the ushers would hand out candles, the lights would be turned down low, and the whole church would sing Silent Night.  Bam.  Christmas MAGIC. 

I still love the beautiful/magical side of Christmas . . . but I’ve started to wonder if that’s really the thing we should be pursuing.  Last year, our church held our Christmas Eve service in a barn . . . and it touched me in a completely different way than Christmas services ever have.  There was an ugly beat up old barn, hay, cow manure, and a bunch of people.   No beautiful Christmas tree, no angelic choirs, not even the candles at the end (though we did sing Silent Night!)  Just the stark simplicity that took us back to the humble beginning that Jesus chose 2000 years ago. 

 In his Divine wisdom, Christ chose a rather plain entrance into the world.  Just a barn, a nothing town in the middle of nowhere,  no royalty or religion to be found anywhere.  He came because the people he loved so much were dying in their sin, and our only hope was a Savior who would step into the mess and the ugliness of our time and space to do something about it.  It wasn’t pretty.  It wasn’t magical.

Of all places, Jesus picked a dirty old barn to start his earthly journey, so we’re going to do the same thing in a little over a week.  Maybe it will rain.  Maybe it will be cold and miserable and there won’t be any of that Christmas magic we all love so much.  Maybe that’s the point.

You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.