For the Advent season, we will be using the book Light Upon Light by Sarah Arthur as a guide. Each component of the service will be taken from that book.

 

Opening Prayer:

Lead, Kindly Light, amid the circling gloom,

Lead Thou me on!

The night is dark and I am far from home—

Lead Thou me on!

Keep Thou my feet; I do not ask to see

The distant scene, — one step enough for me.

 

Amen.

 

Text:

Psalm 137

Luke 2:1-7

 

 Literary Selection:

The House Of Christmas by GK Chesterton 

There fared a mother driven forth
Out of an inn to roam;
In the place where she was homeless
All men are at home.
The crazy stable close at hand,
With shaking timber and shifting sand,
Grew a stronger thing to abide and stand
Than the square stones of Rome.

For men are homesick in their homes,
And strangers under the sun,
And they lay on their heads in a foreign land
Whenever the day is done.
Here we have battle and blazing eyes,
And chance and honour and high surprise,
But our homes are under miraculous skies
Where the yule tale was begun.

A Child in a foul stable,
Where the beasts feed and foam;
Only where He was homeless
Are you and I at home;
We have hands that fashion and heads that know,
But our hearts we lost - how long ago!
In a place no chart nor ship can show
Under the sky's dome.

This world is wild as an old wives' tale,
And strange the plain things are,
The earth is enough and the air is enough
For our wonder and our war;
But our rest is as far as the fire-drake swings
And our peace is put in impossible things
Where clashed and thundered unthinkable wings
Round an incredible star.

To an open house in the evening
Home shall men come,
To an older place than Eden
And a taller town than Rome.
To the end of the way of the wandering star,
To the things that cannot be and that are,
To the place where God was homeless
And all men are at home.

 

Benediction:

So long Thy power hath blest me, sure it still

Will lead me on,

O’er moon and fen, o’er crag and torrent, till

The night is gone;

And with the morn those angel faces smile

Which I have loved long since, and lost awhile.

 

Amen.