Christmas Worship

We spent the last hour continuing our preparations for the brunch and worship. As 10 a.m. rolled around, we had a few individuals. One of the infrequent attenders, a young lady, brought along her boyfriend, which was his first time in the church and staying for the worship.

We began the brunch portion, and as the minutes passed by, some of the other members drifted in. We definitely had much more food ready than would be consumed. It's better to have more than to run short. There were rehearsals for tomorrow and Christmas Day going on in other parts of town which conflicted with the schedules of some who would have liked to join us.

As we moved into the sanctuary to begin our worship time, about half the family living across the street from our church entered in. The other half arrived mid-way into the program. We were thrilled to see them accept our invitation and join us. Altogether, we had a total of 23 -- about double our attendance on a typical good Sabbath.

We started the worship singing hymns and carols, and then went into the story of Christmas (Matthew 1 & 2, Luke 1 & 2) told in three parts with musical interludes in between. The story was read by Elise, Sheena (spelling? -- the young lady mentioned earlier), and Gerry alternating the paragraphs. Shelley played the more difficult version of Silent Night during the first interlude. Amy and I played a duet, Angels We Have Heard on High, and Sheena sang As a Deer during the second interlude.

Following the reading of the story, I gave a short sermonette on how our mission is to bring and live the hopeful message of Christmas all through the year (and used lyrics from a song in the Sesame Street Christmas CD as an illustration). This was the lead-in to O Holy Night.

Everyone joined in It Came Upon the Midnight Clear to close the service. The audio of the program is available. It begins from the story portion and continues to the end.

Of all the Sabbaths I've had here so far, this one had to be the most stressful. The perfectionist (or is precisionist?) part of me wants everything to play out exactly as planned. And with something like this where I have no idea who and how many might show up, and with so many things that could go away from the plan, it is very stressful. But in the end, it was a very nice and enjoyable service. Nothing I feared happened (as is usually the case).

So will this be the First Annual Petersburg Seventh-day Adventist Church Christmas Worship? I'd like to see it happen.