A sermon on Luke 2:8-20 by Rev Richard Keith on Christmas Day, 2025.
Who is Christmas for? What is it really about? Christmas can’t be just for children. It can’t be just about toys and presents. Otherwise, it isn’t for grown ups too, except maybe the shareholders of Big W.
And it can’t just be for families. It can’t be just about food. Although it is a great time to reconnect with those we care about. Otherwise, it isn’t for the lonely too who often find this season especially hard.
And it can’t just be for the happy, singing Christmas carols at the top of their voice and pulling Christmas crackers. Otherwise it isn’t also for those who are searching for answers, who are longing for peace in a world with so little peace to give.
Today our message is that Christmas is for all the people. For the young and old, for families and friends and the friendless, for the joyful and the weary. Christmas is for everyone and so Christmas is for you. Not just for those you cook for. Not just for those you’ve shopped and wrapped for. But Christmas is for you as well.
For this was the angel’s message. “I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Saviour has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord.”
It was a message of good news, the announcement of the birth of a Saviour. He would be the Christ, the Messiah, God’s promised king long spoken of by the prophets. He would be the Lord, the one to whom generations would look for life and hope.
But this message wasn’t delivered to kings and queens. It wasn’t proclaimed to priests and pastors. It was given to shepherds. Men who did the dirty work. Men who were paid to do the job that no one else wanted to do, keeping watch over the sheep on farms without barns or fences. While others slept in warm comfortable homes, the shepherds camped under the stars. They were poor. They were ordinary. But it was to such men that the angel brought his news.
A message of good news for all people. For rich and poor. For great and small. For Jews and for Greeks and for Aussies and Kiwis. For locals and strangers. For shopkeepers and shepherds.
For people like them, for people like us, the angel brought his message of great joy. This was not the joy of easy laughter or carefree celebration. Not the joy of having everything sorted and nothing to worry about. It was the joy of hope breaking into the darkness. The joy of light shining where life feels fragile. The joy of knowing that even with broken hearts, God has not forgotten his people. It is joy for me. It is joy for you.
And notice how the angel puts it. Not just “A Saviour has been born.” But, “A Saviour has been born to you.” To shepherds on a cold night under open skies. To ordinary people. To tired people. To people with worries they could not fix and futures they could not control. A Saviour born to you. Not at a distance. Not for someone else. Not only for the strong or the sorted. But to you. To people like them. And to people like us.
This is not an abstract promise. Not a general idea. This is personal. The joy of Christmas is not that God sent help somewhere. It is that God sent help to us. A Saviour born into our world, into our darkness, into our brokenness. Born to you.
As the prophet Isaiah said long ago, “The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned. For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”
To us a child is born. To us a son is given. Not just a first born Son for Mary. Not just a step son for Joseph to raise and to teach him his trade. Not just a Messiah for Israel. But a Saviour for the world.
A wonderful counsellor whose wisdom is not shallow or clever, but true, wisdom that shapes lives, and communities, and even societies. Son of the mighty God, the eternal Word through whom all things are made and their existence sustained. The one who not only has the right and authority to save us, but has the power and strength. Everlasting Father, a royal title because he is the king who protects and provides, the source of life and hope for his people. The Prince of Peace, the one who makes peace between us and God, the one who teaches us to seek peace with one another, the one who brings peace to our troubled hearts.
His life and teaching is like light to those who walk in darkness. He is like the coming of the dawn for those who have stumbled about in the shadows of the night. To us this child is born. To us this son is given.
So this Christmas Day, with all that this year has brought, its joys and its losses, its hopes and its disappointments, its highlights that we celebrate and its burdens we still carry, to us this child is born. Not to a different people. Not to a better people. But to us. To us, with our faith and our doubts. To us, with our gratitude and our grief. To us, with our full hearts and our broken ones.
Who is Christmas for? It is for all the people. And that means it is for me. And it is for you.