[pilipo]

I attend a church of ~2600 in St. Louis. We have a pastor that walks the talk, etc.

The church is having a Christmas Eve service, but not having a service on the 25th.

My relationship is with the Lord, and as such is not (in and of itself) diminished by the lack of a Christmas Day service.

Having said that, I wish that the decision to cancel services had not been made. Aside from the principle of the thing, I view the coincidence of the 25th being on a Sunday as a wonderful opportunity to celebrate His birth in His house on His day.

An opportunity missed.

[NYer]

I view the coincidence of the 25th being on a Sunday as a wonderful opportunity to celebrate His birth in His house on His day.

Perhaps I'm missing something here but don't the evangelical churches normally hold services on Sunday? There is a large one near me and their parking lot is always overflowing on Sundays. So, why would a church that is normally open on Sunday close on this Sunday, just because it also happens to be Christmas? What is it that I am not understanding?

[Hawkeye]

pilipo, I tend to agree with you. While my personal preference is for churches to be open on Christmas I've actually listened to Jon Weece's sermon (the entire thing, not just a couple of minutes) on this subject. It can be listened to at the link way up top or people can go to it here. This guy walks the talk (listen to any of his other sermons they are full of plenty of "meat" --- and he was a missionary for several years in Haiti preaching by flashlight in a mud hut). He challenges the church to put its money where its mouth is for Christmas and instead of "going" to church on Christmas day he challenged Christians about "being" the church on Christmas day. But of course that gets lost in the shuffle...