The Joy of Christmas

Sermon 415 St. Martin’s 169 (Riverway) 12/24/25

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5raq9cuJoM

“Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord.”

A few nights ago, I was walking my golden retriever around our neighborhood. It was dark and quiet, and I couldn’t help but stop for a moment at each home that had Christmas lights.

We have a couple of neighbors who’ve gone overboard, but most have kept things fairly simple. What struck me that night was the quaint, even winsome beauty of it all: light casting out the darkness, small bits of color breaking through the night.

I was taken by it all in that moment, and as I looked down the street and saw the faint glimmer of lights all the way down, a profound sense of joy came over me.  

It was something deep in my soul that I had not experienced in some time. Like a long-lost friend, I welcomed that feeling to accompany me, and it has stayed with me ever since.

That’s what I want to talk about with you today: joy. The unassuming and yet utterly life-changing joy that accompanies the news of the angels. Joy seems to be a fundamental part of Christmas, after all, but why is that?

How do Christians throughout the world, some huddled in shacks or gathered in cinderblock churches, others on the frontlines of war or sitting in a homeless shelter or refugee camp; or folks like us, housed in a space that displays the glory of God, how can we all find some semblance of joy this day, regardless of where we are or what we’re going through?

For each and every believer, the joy of Christmas manifests itself because of the joy Christ brings into the world. It’s as simple as that: Jesus brings the joy of heaven with him to earth.

What Jesus offers is a deeper joy than anything this world can give. It’s a joy that lacks sentimentality and will not quickly fade like momentary bouts of happiness.

It is a joy that is real and authentic to our lived experiences. It doesn’t bypass the tougher parts of life, pushing them under the rug. Somehow, those difficult experiences are incorporated into the gift of divine joy, similar to how the darkness enhances the brightness of Christmas lights. God’s joy does not discount any aspect of our lives.

Luke 2 The writer Luke situated the Christmas story in ‘the world,’ the real world of emperors and villagers, of census-taking and tax-collecting. Luke wrote this not as a fairy tale to warm our hearts, but as the verified account of God coming among us, born of a virgin in a small Judean village.

And what’s remarkable in this historical account is just how many times ‘joy’ appears in those opening chapters of Luke’s Gospel. It seemed to be THE experience a person had when they encountered the angel Gabriel and learned of the new thing God was doing.

The unmistakable sign of joy is the number of people who burst into song when they hear of God’s action. These great hymns of praise harken back to Old Testament voices of Moses and Miriam, Hannah and Isaiah, and their songs.

When a human heart has longed for God to act in their lives, and then his purposes are suddenly revealed to them, a natural reaction occurs, and joyous praise bubbles up to the surface.

Elizabeth, overcome by Mary’s greeting, bursts into song while her son, John, leaps for joy in her womb. It’s contagious, and soon enough, Mary, too, begins to magnify the Lord.

Zechariah, mute since meeting the angel in the Temple, opens his mouth with a song of praise of God visiting his people.  

The first two chapters of Luke are like volcanic eruptions of praise wherever the Spirit appears, and the Good News is proclaimed. The people who receive these glad tidings are the unlikeliest of people, far from the halls of civic or religious power, but they, too, long for God’s kingdom to break into the world, and are overcome when they hear that it is actually happening in their time.

In the verses leading up to the Christmas story, Luke seems to be showing that a combination of the Spirit’s presence and the announcement of God’s action leads to exuberant and unrestrained rejoicing.

And it keeps building and building until finally, the great crescendo resounds when the angel of the Lord descends in unadulterated glory upon the shepherds and says, “I bring you good news that will cause great joy for you. Yes, you! But it is not only for you. This is for all people.”

Christmas is about good news that causes great joy in us, and the ripple effects spread throughout the world.

A Deeper Joy What God offers is a deeper, more profound joy that can be the bedrock upon which we build our lives.

As we’ve already said, this joy is not dependent on our situation or circumstance, nor is it based on wealth or class. Mary is the perfect example of that. She was a nobody from nowhere with little to no money to her name. 

Yet the joy she finds (along with the others in the opening chapters of Luke) is rooted in God’s decisive action for the world; something so grand, and yet it was somehow for her as well. Mary found herself caught up in God’s act of redemption.

This decisive action was the Incarnation. The answer to humanity’s ills was not a program or a prescription, but a person, a baby to be exact, who, if you came across him that holy night, you would have been overcome by his simple beauty and yet fragility. Like any other, he required the attentive care of a newborn.

For the first time, the Author of all things entered his story, and did so in great humility and weakness. From then on, God could confidently say that he knew what it is like to be one of us. 

Giovanni di Paolo - The Nativity

As Christians, when we say God knows what we’re going through, we mean it. The Incarnation proves God’s commitment to us—he will not leave us to live in isolation and fear. In fact, this miracle raises up all of humanity because God willingly chose to become one of us. There is no higher honor for us.

As St. Augustine once said, “So that humans might be born of God, God was born of humans.” For the first time, God had a heartbeat; the One who breathed life into Adam’s nostrils took a breath with his own lungs.

The Incarnation raises up all humanity because the Son, who is “the radiance of God’s glory and the exact [imprint] of [God’s] being”[i] has lowered himself so that we might one day be born of God. 

Our reading from Hebrews is one grand song proclaiming the majesty of the Son who took on flesh and dwelt among us. It was written in the same Spirit as those who burst into song earlier in Luke. The joyous song continues in every generation.

Though far superior to the angels, Jesus did not abhor the virgin’s womb. Though through him (and for him) all things came into being, our Lord did not stand idle as we suffered in our weakness. He took on every aspect of what it meant to be human in order that he could heal it all.[ii]

In the manger we find God’s answer to our fraught condition, and his arrival marks the transformation of creation from the inside out. Humanity will be healed, set right, and made whole from within.

God acts, and people rejoice. This is why Christians in every generation, in every circumstance, amid war or peace, famine or plenty, contentment or sorrow, have been able to find a joy that carries us through all seasons.   

It is a joy the world cannot give, nor can it take it away, once you have it. We are anchored in something more profound, to a foundation that is set upon the rock, so that whatever life throws our way, we know deep in our bones that Jesus has brought the joy of heaven to earth, and it can now reside in our hearts.

That has been the Christmas experience for so many, including a man named James Montgomery.

Finding God's Joy[iii] James grew up in Scotland in the late 18^th century and was a member of the Moravian Church, one of the oldest Protestant denominations. The Moravians were known for their emphasis on Christian mission.

Driven by this passion to share the gospel, James’ parents felt called to leave Scotland and become missionaries in the West Indies. They made the difficult decision to place six-year-old James in a boarding school while they did ministry on the other side of the Atlantic—a gut-wrenching decision for any parent.

Tragically, James’ parents died on that trip, and he was left with nothing. No parents, no financial security, and he hadn’t even turned seven.

He spent his teenage years drifting aimlessly. He would write poetry and try his hand at one thing or another, but he lacked any sense of purpose.

Looking at his early life, he seemed to either fail or quit whatever he did. He tried working in two different retail shops, but he couldn’t stand it. He went to London to get some of his poems published, but no one gave him a chance. The bad news kept piling up.

Finally, he was hired as an assistant to a man who owned a small newspaper, and his life would never be the same.

He had finally found his vocation as the editor of The Sheffield Iris. It gave him an outlet to develop his writing voice and to hone his skills. When his editorials proved unpopular with the local officials, he was jailed and fined twenty pounds.

But he emerged from jail a celebrity, and he used his newly acquired fame to promote other topics that he was passionate about, chief among them was the gospel.

Despite the loss of his parents and all of his early hardships, James Montgomery remained a devoted follower. He had countless opportunities to walk away from the faith, and could have blamed God for what had befallen him, but instead, he found in the person of Jesus someone who knew his pain and who could bring joy, deep and abiding joy, even from life’s most difficult seasons.

As the years passed, he became one of the most respected leaders in Sheffield and a prestigious writer, thanks to the newspaper.

Early on Christmas Eve in 1816, James, then forty-five, opened his Bible and was deeply moved by the heavenly host’s joyous news to the shepherds. He took his pen and began writing. By the end of the day, his new Christmas poem was being delivered around England in the pages of his newspaper.

It was later set to music and was first sung on Christmas Day, five years later, in a Moravian Church in England. We just sang it:

Angels from the realms of glory, Wing your flight o'er all the earth; Ye who sang creation's story, Now proclaim Messiah's birth; Come and worship, Come and worship, Worship Christ the newborn King.

In total, James Montgomery wrote over 400 hymns and is regarded as one of the greatest hymn writers of his generation. But this story is not about James; it is about the One he wrote all those hymns about.

Rather than letting tragedy and hardship define the rest of his life, James put his faith in something (or better yet, Someone) greater than himself. He found purpose and joy in his life, not in his ever-changing circumstances, but in the God who acts in love on behalf of his people.

This is the joy that Christmas brings. Jesus’ Incarnation reminds us that God did not transcend human experience but transformed it from the inside out, bringing us closer to the heart of God and to the divine joy shared by the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

It is a gift for you, as a beloved child of God, and for this world that desperately needs to rediscover a lasting, eternal joy. However you find yourself this Christmas, what is being given to you is something deeper, more real, and precious than anything this side of heaven can offer.

Rejoice with the angels from the realms of glory, and do not be afraid, they bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. For today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord.”

[i] Hebrews 1:3, NIV

[ii] Gregory of Nazianzus: "What has not been assumed has not been healed."

[iii] Story from Preacher’s Sourcebook of Creative Sermon Illustration by Robert J. Morgan