Tonight, there is a stillness, and it happens every Christmas Eve. It never happens on any other night nor does it happen on Christmas day, only at night, on this night. No matter how old you are, you can still feel it, which is, perhaps, why so many people have written countless songs about it, but what it is, is not entirely clear.

Perhaps, it is the exhaustion of the world after preparing, after impatiently waiting, perhaps, it is the calm before the storm of family and friends, yet, while those things bring quiet, that is not what this is, it is different.

It is almost a silence, a stillness, a peace that penetrates and permeates unlike any other. Perhaps, what the shepherds might have experienced, as they kept watch, or as the Magi encountered as they followed a star to Bethlehem. Or as Mary and Joseph felt as they knelt before their newborn child as He slept.

It is almost as though creation itself is hushed to let that little child sleep. Perhaps, this is what that silence is, one of the few times when it is not just us, but the entirety of creation that bows down in adoration before Him, and we experience this as reverential.

In fact, that is why we are here tonight and what we are reminded of, that great and beautiful mystery when earth itself entered Heaven and Heaven came down to earth.

Our journey from the days of Advent has, at last ended, and, tonight, we find ourselves in Bethlehem where we are invited to humbly kneel before the child Jesus and, like Mary, to ponder in our hearts. Because, in the words of St. John Chrysostom: “Bethlehem this day resembles heaven; hearing from the stars the singing of angelic voices.”

The same reality, then, experienced over 2000 years ago occurs again this night, in this church, in our town, in our world, for all of creation itself bows before its creator, and the very mystery of the Incarnation becomes tangible and unfolds before every single one us. So that, in the words of St. Athanasius: “God became man, so that man might become God.”

It is a mystery that we cannot even begin to fathom, begin to comprehend, yet, what we do understand is so overwhelming, so amazing, so phenomenal, that we cannot but help to fall down in adoration and rejoice, to join with the angels and the saints in their triumphant hymn of praise.

Because, tonight, is not just Christmas, it is a reminder of the very culmination of our salvation and that what we have is truly God’s gift to us, that this night, that this child, more than any other gift we may receive, is the only gift we will ever need, because, as clichéd as it may sound, it is not a thousand presents that He gives us but only His presence among us.

That is why we are here tonight and why we gather in this Church, to adore Him, our savior, and to recall the time when God Himself became a little child to save us, when Mary held in Her arms the same child who held Her in His. He who is Our Emmanuel, our Wonder-Counselor, our Prince of Peace, He who came into this world lying on the wood of a manger only to leave this world lying on the wood of the cross.

Therefore, tonight, let us celebrate and adore, and with the choirs of heavenly angels sing that triumphant hymn of praise: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to people of good will.”