All of our major Christmas celebrations came to a close tonight. We wrapped up all of the singing, gathering and the like with our Candlelight service. It never ceases to amaze me how many people come out for this service. This probably speaks more to the pessimist in me than anything else. Our bottom floor was fairly full on this occasion. We have children or students read parts of the original Christmas story to us from Luke 2. Mixed with the readings are familiar hymns of the season. Kids continue to grow up and out of the reading part every year. Some of the ones who once read are now moved off to college. We then experience the Lord's Supper together. I added this part to our service years ago. Spending time going through this celebration reminds of all this season means. Ending the service is about having candles lit one by one throughout the auditorium. We then walk out to the front yard singing "Silent Night" together. All of this is a fitting climax to all we do for the holidays.

There are still a few days left until we hit the big day. Church activity slows down quite a bit this week. My view is that these last few days can be devoted to family and friends. Some will be traveling. Some will have company next Saturday. I would imagine there are those people who have last minute plans for shopping. Catching our breath will have to wait for another week or two. We will begin 2011 possibly worn out by all we do at the end of 2010. Starting a new year will be a welcome thing for some of us. I certainly hope that next year goes much better than this one. Maybe a full head of hair will last me an entire year this time. Some people will say that the next year cannot be worse than the last one. I avoid that totally. I see no point to add aggravation to any time now or in the future. Besides, there is more to life than the conditions of any given moment.

Even the birth of Jesus is not without difficulty. Think about the response of those who would hear a young woman claim that God conceived within her. Joseph seems to have trouble with that news and he knew Mary well. How can we imagine that others would feel with that story? There is also a long trip to Bethlehem which could not be easy on an expectant mother. Plus, upon arrival the family can only find shelter in a local barn. We seldom stop to think upon the physical, emotional, financial or even spiritual stress of that first Christmas. God was indeed at work in their lives but it was not always comfortable. Jesus would be born in a most common place to people just like us. They do experience an awesome miracle that changes the course of history. I also suspect there was a need for ongoing miracles of all sizes to keep them going when times got rough.

Our worship tonight was warm with all of the comforts of modern life. Reality is that we seldom get to live that way on a consistent basis. I like to say that life is a full contact sport. I don't mean to say that we are devoid of God's blessing as we move along. But we tend to forget that the origin of our faith is just as real as contemporary living. Jesus comes not to be divorced from every day happenings. He models for us what it means to tie our God side to our human side. This is when we really begin to catch on to the entire Christian journey. He is our constant in the ups and downs in life. One of my hopes for 2011 is we can discover how to be biblical wherever we are. Let's make our faith less a matter of our conditions and more about anchoring to the very real presence of God.

Bro. Trey