Outline of A Service  of Las Posadas

Recital (if possible with 2 or 3 Christmas carols, perhaps arranged for organ preludes)

Chimes

Prelude

Call to Worship

Lighting of Advent Wreath

Joseph and Mary stand outside the sanctuary accompanied by youths and children. One member of the group outside knocks on the sanctuary door and says:

Listen! I am standing at the door knocking.
If you hear my voice and open the door,
I will come in to you and eat with you, and you with me.

Hymn: "O come, O come, Emmanuel" (Verses 1-4). . . . #211

People outside the sanctuary slowly walk up the isle. Joseph speaks for all of them:

In the name of God, we beg: will you let us in? We are tired and we are cold. May we please have shelter?

Inn-keeper:

You look dirty and you smell. Will you please keep moving?! For you kind there is no place, for our inn is decent.

Joseph:

It is not by our own choice that today we travel. But the emperor has said that all must be counted--even the dimples and the chads.

Inn-keeper:

For your reasons I care not, can't you see we are full? There is no room left in here--especially not for your kind: foreigners and peasants. You are bad for business!

Congregation (in unison): He was in world, and the world came into being through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. But all who did receive him, who believed his name, he gave power to become children of God.

Hymn: "It Came upon the Midnight Clear" . . . . 218

Joseph:

For goodness sake, please make some room for us, for my wife is with child and she could give birth any time. The child she carries is a special child, blessed by God Almighty--even the Savior of the world! If you don't want to help us for our sakes, do it for God's sake in accordance to God's Law of Love.

Inn-keeper:

What is the Law of Love?

Congregation (in unison): You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

In-keeper:

I have faith in God, but who is to say who is my neighbor? Anybody could knock at my door to ask for help or a handout. Can I help them all?

Congregation (in unison): What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if you say you have faith but do not have works? Can faith save you? If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of them says to them: "God in peace, keep warm, and eat your fill," and yet you do not supply their needs, what is the good of that? (James 2:14-17)

Joseph:

Will the child be born tonight out on a street corner? Can't you find a place for him? Do you have no pity?

Inn-keeper:

Oh, my goodness, do come in. You can stay in the stable. Perhaps you can use the manger for a bed.

Hymn "Away in a Manger" . . . . .# 217

Offering

Organ Offertory

Song of Dedication: Doxology . . .#95

Prayer of Dedication

Hymn: "Angels we have heard on High" . . . . . #238

Scripture Reading . . . Luke 2:1-20

Solo:    "O Holy Night"

Christmas Prayer followed by the Lord's Prayer (in unison--"debts, debtors")

Candle-Lighting Service

Hymn: "Silent Night, Holy Night" . . . . . #239

Dismissal and Blessing

Chimes

Postlude