Koonung Heights Uniting Church – Service of Worship at Home
Christmas Day – 25 December – 9am or whenever possible
You may like to light a candle during your time of worship.
Feel free to text the Peace to other members of the congregation.
We Sing: “O come, all ye faithful” – (Click on this link and skip the ads)
Acknowledgement of Country:
We come on this special day
to worship and to greet the new born child.
As we gather, I acknowledge
the Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung People of the Kulin nation.
I pay my respects to their elders, past and present,
and to all generations to come.
When each child is born, they reveal something of God,
and represent hope for the future.
May we see this hope in the faces of all people.
Call to Worship:
Incarnation is here
in the heart of our world’s living,
in the heart of our community spirit,
in the heart of this and every place.
This is where Jesus is born
at the heart of it all.
Let us worship the One,
present with us
and one of us.
Happy Christmas!
Advent Wreath:
Over a hundred people, from the ages of two to eighty years old, were asked to fill in the blank for the statement: “My story is … “ From the voices of different generations, hear their answers:
Amazing!
Just beginning.
A wee bit messy, with lots of love.
Privileged.
Hopeful.
Full of silliness.
Still unfolding.
Long, but good.
One of resilience.
Incomplete, thank goodness.
Multilingual.
A work in progress.
My story is not just mine – it’s tied to yours.
Today we tell the story that we tell every year – the story of Christ’s birth,
the story of love made flesh.
It’s a story that weaves through every generation
a story that picks up the bits and pieces of our narrative and braids us together.
So today we light the Christ candle, because from generation to generation,
our story belongs to God.
Thanks be to God for a love like that.
Amen.
We Sing: “Christians, awake” – (Click on this link and skip the ads)
Prayer of Adoration and Confession:
The celebration of Christmas has just begun,
some of us have given and received gifts,
yet we know there is another gift which has been given.
Loving God,
you have wrapped the gift of your Son,
Jesus Christ, around our lives.
The light of your love through him is shining brightly,
not harshly, but in a multitude of colours
that remind us of the wondrous ways you love us.
Open our hearts and spirits with joy
as we come to worship you today.
God,
we admit that we don’t fully understand the Christmas story,
we are not familiar with angel choruses,
we have not walked many miles to be counted in a census,
and we don’t always hear your voice in our dreams.
We don’t fully understand this story, so we admit,
sometimes we hesitate to tell it.
Instead of running out into the streets
to shout that there is a love bigger than we could imagine,
we whisper this good news.
Instead of throwing open the doors and inviting people in,
we simply leave them unlocked, hoping they will figure it out.
Instead of telling the next generation why today matters so much,
we stay quiet, afraid of creating pressure.
Forgive us for our silence.
Forgive us for our hesitation.
Forgive us for the moments when we fail to share your good news.
Plant this story of love so deep in our bones that we cannot help but share it
from generation to generation.
Amen.
Words of Assurance:
No matter where we go,
no matter what we say,
no matter what we do,
we belong to God.
We are held,
we are loved,
we are forgiven!
Amen.
The Peace:
In Jesus, Emmanuel, God is truly with us.
May the peace of Jesus, the Christ, be with you … and also with you.
Bible Reading: Luke 2:1-7 – The Birth of Jesus
1 In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. 2 This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. 3 All went to their own towns to be registered. 4 Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called Bethlehem, because he was descended from the house and family of David. 5 He went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child. 6 While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child. 7 And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.
We Sing: “Away in a Manger” – (Click on this link and skip the ads)
Bible Reading: Luke 2:8-20 – The Shepherds and the Angels
8 In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night.
9 Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. 10 But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: 11 to you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is the Messiah, the Lord. 12 This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.” 13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying,
14 “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favours!”
15 When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us.” 16 So they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger. 17 When they saw this, they made known what had been told them about this child; 18 and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds told them. 19 But Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart. 20 The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.
We Sing: “The Virgin Mary had a baby boy” – (Click on this link and skip the ads)
We Listen: Sing: “Retooning the Nativity” – (Click on this link and watch)
Watch and listen to the reflection
Reflection:
Each of us have a birth story. While it is unlikely that we remember anything of our own birth, we may know some of the story associated with it from what we’ve been told. I was born in the days when mothers stayed in hospital for quite a while so my dad didn’t bring my mother and I home until Christmas Eve. One of my birth stories concerns my cousin Diane, who was only five years old when I was born. She was most concerned that if I didn’t make it home on Christmas Eve Santa wouldn’t know where to find me and he wouldn’t be able to leave me a present!
Each year we gather again to tell the story of Jesus birth, to sing familiar carols and to gaze on the nativity. But, as we’ve just seen, the reality is that the story we tell, the carols we sing, and the nativity we look at, are largely tradition built of different accounts that reflect a later Christian piety. So what happened on that so called “first Christmas”?
Well, the actual birth day of Jesus was not December 25. Early Christians used to celebrate this event at different times, but in the fourth century December 25 was the official date adopted by the Christian church. It is likely this date was chosen because ancient theologians wanted to be able to link Jesus’ conception with his death, nine months prior to December 25.
Similarly, what we think of as an inn, was probably the guest room in a house. It’s likely it was too small for childbirth and so Mary had to move from there, possibly ending up in the main room of the house where animal mangers could also be found.
Animals do not, in fact, appear in nativity scene art until the fourth century CE, which was part of the anti-Jewish polemic, claiming that even animals understood the significance of Jesus in a way that Jews did not. And when we gather around a nativity scene in our home or church, we are following a tradition that began with Francis of Assisi who, in the twelfth century brought a crib and animals into church so that worshippers could feel part of the story.
While there is nothing wrong with the devotion of Christian tradition, the historical reality is somewhat different. As Associate Professor Rev Robyn Whitaker reminds us, ‘the Jesus of history was a child of a Jewish family living under a foreign regime. He was born into an extended family living away from home and his family fled from a king who sought to kill him because he posed a political threat. The Jesus story, in its historical context, is one of human terror and divine mercy, of human abuse and divine love. It is a story that claims God became human in the form of one who is vulnerable, poor and displaced in order to unveil the injustice of tyrannical power. It is a story which celebrates God becoming human as a gift of love.
And when all the human tradition is laid aside, that’s what matters. It’s the fact that God loved us enough to become human, that God shows up, that means this is the story we need to keep telling. Jesus’ story is filled with joy, pain and all the complexities of being human. It is also a sacred story that has us at its heart.
It’s a story that is so important to tell that we keep telling it. From generation to generation, we gather every year and listen to it again. It’s probably part of the reason we’ve gathered bits and pieces of tradition around it, things that bring the story to life and help us remember, images that help us make sense of something that is hard to understand, yet something that touches us so deeply.
That’s why we tell this story every year. We tell it because it illustrates so clearly God’s desire to be in relationship with us. We tell this story because we, too, are invited to come to the manger and witness the miracle of birth. We tell this story because it brings up hope and good news – hope especially for those the world deems powerless, unworthy or unwelcome. We tell this story because it is a story we need to hear again and again.
Let us continue to tell this story of ordinary people who were brave. Let us continue to tell this story of love that changed the world. Let us continue to tell the story of angel choruses that give us a reason to hope, and starlight that reminds us to look up.
Let us continue to tell the story of God showing up, and in doing so, invite others to also come to delight in this amazing gift.
Amen.
We Sing: “God became flesh with us to dwell” – (Click this link & skip ads for the tune – words below)
From Galilee to Bethlehem
Did Mary and Joseph their journey begin
Many miles from home without a room
Emmanuel came forth from Mary’s womb
Noel, noel, noel, noel, God became flesh with us to dwell.
Abiding in the fields that night
The shepherds saw a radiant light
When angels came to fill the sky
Breaking into earth from heaven on high
Noel, noel, noel, noel, God became flesh with us to dwell.
The shepherds went as the angels has said
To a manger in town with haste they sped
And there as earth and heaven converged
They shared with the parents all that had occurred
Noel, noel, noel, noel, God became flesh with us to dwell.
Affirmation of Faith
We believe that for generations
people have gathered together on this holy day,
because there is something about this story
that speaks to the deepest parts of us.
We believe in bundling up this hope,
this good news, and passing it on –
to our children, to our neighbours,
to the world around us.
I believe my voice can make a difference,
just like I believe this story can make a difference,
so I will not stay quiet.
I will tell this story—of a love that makes room for all.
I will sing this story—of a love that knows our name.
I will live this story—because love has come again.
Amen.
Prayer for Others (written by Harriet Ziegler):
On this special Christmas Sunday, the beautiful carols, so well-known to us, offer us more than something nice to go away humming; they also offer us a way to pray.
This prayer has a response. When I say,
O come let us adore You, please respond, if you feel able, with:
Let us adore You with our lives.
Let us pray.
God of the manger and of the marketplace, Lord of the hillsides and of the halls of power, we come with joy in our hearts, singing of joy to the world. We come saluting this very happy morning, filled with gratitude for the gift of the life and teaching and companionship of Jesus.
We sing away in a manger, no crib for a bed. Yet if we are honest, we know there are mothers and infants, even here in our very own nation, who would be happy for a manger, who also have no crib, no bed, no shelter tonight or any other night.
Around the world, in every country, too many of your children sleep on the streets, without shelter, without protection. We pray for all who are homeless, who are hungry, who go without to feed their children, who cannot piece together the necessities of life for one more day. We pray that we may grow in our sensitivity toward them and in generosity toward those causes that help ease their anguish.
O come let us adore You … Let us adore You with our lives.
We sing O little town of Bethlehem, how still we see you lie. Yet all is not still in Bethlehem. Armed guards watch all the pilgrims to the holy sites, and all the people who live where you once walked – the Christians, the Muslims and the Jews. Tension runs high in the contested territories of Israel and Palestine. We pray that peace and stillness may come soon to Bethlehem, as to so many other contested territories and invaded countries around the world. Especially today we pray for the people of Ukraine, who are freezing in the European winter. We pray for the women and girls of Iran and Afghanistan, and everywhere where men and women are unable to live as equals. We pray for all the people caught in the small and unheralded conflicts. May we not grow tired and turn away, but may we hold these difficult situations in our thoughts and prayers, and live in ways that promote peace and justice.
O come let us adore You … Let us adore You with our lives.
We sing Silent night, holy night, but for many the nights are anything but holy – they are too silent, too long, too lonely. We hold before you everyone known to us who is lonely, who is bereaved, who has lost a loved one, a meaningful job, a sense of purpose, everyone who is making a transition from one place to another, one school to another, everyone for whom the nights can feel too silent. We remember them in a moment of silence.
(Time of silence)
May we not only pray for these people, but may we be instruments of your love and presence, with a word, a card, a visit, a call.
O come let us adore You … Let us adore You with our lives.We sing Christians awake, salute the happy morn. We give thanks that we are free to worship, and we give thanks for this congregation, for all its members and friends, for our minister, Rev Heather, for our musicians, and for all who contribute to the life of this congregation. We give thanks for the Uniting Church in Australia, and for all the churches of Australia. We give thanks, too, that there are people who worship you in different ways, in different languages, in different countries all around the world. Whoever we are, may our worship extend beyond the walls where we worship and may we help bring your will for love, for peace, for justice to the world.
O come let us adore You … Let us adore You with our lives.
As we adore you, let us now pray as you taught us to …
Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name;
Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our sins
as we forgive those who sin against us.
Save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil.
For the Kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours now and forever.
Amen.
We Sing: “Hark! the herald angels sing” – (Click on this link & skip the ads)
Blessing:
As you go from here this Christmas Day,
may you go knowing that
from generation to generation,
we have been claimed and loved.
From generation to generation
God has been by our side.
From generation to generation,
we are not alone,
God continues to show up because God cannot stay away.
The God of yesterday and the God of tomorrow
knows you by name, loves you and calls you forth, saying
“Go be the person you are called to be,
love wildly and do justice,
this Christmas Day and always.
Amen.
We Sing: “Joy to the World” – (Click on this link & skip the ads – TIS words below)
Thanks to all those who have assisted in preparation for this liturgy with encouragement, prayers and conversation. I have also utilised the following resources:- Spill the Beans (Issue 45), Ministry Matters, Billabong Worship Resources, A Sanctified Art, www.skitguys.com, What history really tells us about the birth of Jesus (Robyn Whitaker).