Christmas at Leigh Road Baptist Church: You’re invited!
All-Age Nativity Service
Sunday 8th December 2013 10.30 am
Join us for our traditional treat – the family nativity service. Fun, laughter and ‘Away in a Manger’ – just perfect.
Beer and Carols in The Broker Freehouse
Sunday 15th December 2013 8.00pm
Join us at our local pub for a good Carol sing (and a pint).
Carol Services
Sunday 22nd December 2013 4 pm and 6.30 pm
Get in the mood to celebrate Christmas and join us for our ever popular annual Carol services. Sprinkled with candlelight and served with mincepies.
Candlelit Midnight Communion
Tuesday 24th December 2013 11.30pm
We would be delighted if you could join us to welcome in Christmas day with a very special midnight communion.
Christmas Day All-Age Service
Wednesday 25th December 2013 10.00am
‘The light of life’ Come and celebrate with us on Christmas morning. Christmas Starts with Christ!
Explore Christ this Christmas visit www.christmasstarts.com
We look forward to seeing you.
Here are the short films that we have featured in services this Christmas so you have a chance to catch them again.
Carols By Candlelight
Come Thou Long Expected Jesus by the Skit Guys
Candlelit Midnight Communion on Christmas Eve
Video poem transcript
It used to be summer when Christmas came round,
Neath tall southern skies, over sun-scorched ground,
With the backyard cricket, the barbies, the beach,
And munching on mangoes to watch the Queen’s Speech.
The slatherings of sunscreen, the glorious glare
And toasting the glow in the warm evening air.
It used to be summer… when I was young.
A golden age in a land far flung.
But there came a point, I crossed a divide,
Went up in the world and summer had died.
December is dark now, the nights close in,
So we huddle together as kith and as kin.
It’s winter now when Christmas rolls round,
We celebrate still though with different surrounds.
We mull the wine and strike the matches,
Light the fires, batten the hatches,
Gather around the warming beam
Of family love or a TV screen.
So safe inside, no place to go,
We toast marshmallows and let it snow.
Our summer’s gone, if you’ve been around,
you’ve felt the fall: life’s run aground.
We’ve gone up in the world, seen summer die.
So what’s our hope? The dark defy?
Stoke the hearth? Retreat indoors?
Rug up warm with you and yours?
The shadow reaches even here,
But THIS is the place for Christmas cheer.
It’s dark, in the bible, when Christmas is spoken.
Always a bolt from the blue for the broken.
It’s the valley of shadow, the land of the dead,
It’s, “No place in the inn,” so He stoops to the shed.
He’s born to the shameful, bends to the weak,
becomes the lowly: the God who can’t speak!
And yet, what a Word, this Saviour who comes,
Our dismal, abysmal depths He plumbs.
Through crib and then cross, to compass our life.
To carry and conquer. Our Brother in strife.
He became what we are: our failures He shouldered,
To bring us to His life: forever enfolded.
He took on our frailty, He took on all-comers,
To turn all our winters to glorious summers.
It’s Christmas now… whatever the weather,
Some soak in the sun, some huddle together.
But fair days or foul, our plight He embraces.
Real Christmas can shine in the darkest of places.