Christmas Carol Service - (Four Doors of Christmas)
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Isaiah 7 v 14 ‘The Lord will give you a sign: the virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel (meaning God with us).’
Behind these doors are four things that will give us a clearer understanding of what Christmas is all about.
Carol singing is such a part of our culture - so familiar, beautiful words and melodies, but they can act like a lullaby (eg like the Christmas Lullaby John Rutter), causing us to drift into a spiritual slumber, not touched or challenged just soothed.
This Christmas, let us engage with the true message of Christmas and be enlivened and changed by this glad tidings of great joy.
Door 1: A Clock - What could that mean? A clock for telling the time.
Galatians 4:4 ‘When the set time had fully come, God sent his son….that we might receive adoption to sonship…’
Just like the prophet foretold in Isa 60:22, ‘When the time is right the Lord will make it happen.’
God planned this to happen, way back to Genesis after mankind first sinned. Gen 3:15 ‘I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your offspring and hers – he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.’
From that moment, the clock was set, waiting for the one who would crush the serpent, the devil’s head. Jesus was that one. When the time was right, God orchestrated the events to make it happen. God brought together the WHO, HOW, WHEN & WHERE – in Bethlehem, Christ the Saviour was born.
Door 2: A Gift - What could that mean?
Christmas is a time of giving and receiving gifts, but why do we do that? I believe it is because the greatest gift of all was given on that first Christmas. God so loved the world that he gave a gift, and what a gift! By the Holy Spirit God planted the Christ seed in the womb of Mary. God so loved the world that he gave Jesus, the greatest gift of all time.
John 3:16 ‘God so loved the world (so loved you and me) that he gave his only son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. If we put our lives in his hands, then we get this amazing gift of new life in Jesus, which includes eternal life.’
Door 3: Four Candles
The 4 candles around the Jesus Candle in the middle represent LOVE (of), HOPE (in), JOY (wth’in) & PEACE (with). We have spoken love of God for us, what about hope, Joy & Peace? Hope: not ‘wishful thinking,’ it is an assurance based on Jesus. The people… in darkness have seen a great light, Isaiah 9:2. JOY within our hearts because of all God has done for us. PEACE = peace with God. Each point to Jesus Christ at the centre.
Door 4: Emmanuel
עִמָּנוּ/אֵל - “God with Us” This is the Message of Christmas in one Hebrew word: Emmanuel.
Let me explain, 740 years before the first Christmas, the Prophet Isaiah 7:14 ‘The Lord will give you a sign: the virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Emmanuel (meaning God with us).’
Then 740’ish years later, the Virgin Mary conceived and gave birth to a son, Jesus, who is God with us. Emmanu-el. El = God.
The first believers worshipped Jesus because they knew he was God. Look at his life, his claims (the I am sayings) his healings, his miracles, his perfect life. The first followers of Jesus were convinced that he was/is God.
Christianity is not just a good story. Pilgrims visit Bethlehem because Christ the Saviour was born there. That 750-year-old prophecy said he is – God. If Christmas is right all the rest makes sense…his perfect life, the cross, the resurrection, the door to eternal life.
What about Immanu = ‘With us?’ God born human so that he can be with us.
With us means one of us. Soft, huggable, vulnerable, baby in a manger, a baby needing his mother, Mary. That’s the Christmas story. That’s crazy! Only Christianity has said God has become human. Tests, trials and suffered as we do. He has been where you are. Do you feel broken? He was, do you feel deserted? He was. Have you experienced injustice? He has. Have you faced death and dying? He has.
Jesus is someone you can talk to, pray to, who knows that what you are going through is tough. In Prayer, you can talk to him about anything – he understands, he has been there, he is WITH us.
KING Charles has cancer. He has been open about his suffering. Now he seems more accessible. He knows what ill health is like. The public responds. He has been where we have been, he seems reachable.
How much more King Jesus: broken, beaten, born in poverty in a manger - WITH us. One of us.
‘With us’ also means with & within you if you invite him into your life he will (always) be with us. Instead of religion, you get a person - Jesus. If you think about a close relationship you are in, how it came about how it developed. Spending time, talking, sharing, caring. Christ with us is a bit like that.
Will you let Him in?
I ask this because there is another door, and it is the door to your heart. Famous painting “The Light of the World” by Wm Holman Hunt. Revelation 3:20: “I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will enter his house and dine with him, and he with me.”
The painting depicts Jesus knocking at a door with no handle on the outside. The door is overgrown with weeds and ivy, implying this door has never been opened.
The person on the other side of the door has ignored the knocking of Jesus long enough. Is that you? Could this be the night when you open your heart’s door to the Lord Jesus? In this painting, the handle is on the inside, your side. Rev 3:20 says ‘If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will enter...’
I hope the 4 doors of Christmas have illuminated the Christmas message for you this year. Please do not let it wash over you like a Christmas lullaby.
If you truly believe, respond in wonder and worship. "Glory to the newborn King: peace on earth, and mercy mild, God and sinners reconciled!.. Veiled in flesh the Godhead see; hail the incarnate Deity, pleased as man with man to dwell, Jesus, our Emmanuel.”
If you have never opened the door, Jesus is knocking. Open your life’s door to him.
“Fall on your knees…O night when Christ was born”
Footnote: Sermon preached at St Paul’s Barton I.o.Wight 2025
