“O come, let us adore him”

Christmas is a time of celebration, especially for Christians. The well-known hymn that includes the words in the title above (“Adeste Fideles,” often attributed to John Francis Wade) is sung in churches around the world during the Christmas season. It conjures up images of the gift-bearing wise men who came to worship the baby Jesus when he was born in Bethlehem. The hymn is a call to adore or worship Christ, so fully manifested in Jesus. Christ is the ideal of God, the way of salvation from sin, sickness, and mortality.

Christmas is celebrated in various ways, with parties, shopping for colorful gifts, and festive lights adorning homes and streets. It is also a season for joyful caroling and happy times spent with loved ones, as well as for church services, prayerful meditation, and thanksgiving. In my part of the world, Nigeria, while there is a strong emphasis on the festivities, Christmas Day is considered a holy day, and churches tend to see increased attendance at Christmas services, regardless of the day of the week on which the holiday falls.

Many who don’t attend regularly make the special effort to go to church. Why? Could it be that gathering in fellowship hints at the spiritual unity that shows us all to be children of the one divine Parent, God? Could it also be that something indefinable tugs at our hearts, making us yearn for the truth that Christ Jesus says makes us free and promising comfort and healing to the worried, sorrowing, or sick? The good news is that we can feel more of this freeing, comforting truth—the healing and saving presence of Christ—not only on Christmas Day, but every day, through spiritual worship. The Bible describes what this is, and what it means in practical terms. 

Jesus said that the true worship of God must be “in spirit and in truth” (John 4:24). Worship is adoration and reverence, inspiring praise for and joy in God. It springs from the heart. The Science of Christ, revealed to Mary Baker Eddy, teaches that we adore God as we learn who God is, who we truly are, and what He does for us. 

God is divine Love, the source of all goodness, loving us all without measure. We can accept God’s love with childlike faith even before we feel it. Then, as we seek to know God better, we begin to experience, even if in small ways initially, the blessings that come from understanding and knowing God. And our hearts naturally overflow with praise and adoration for God—the source of these blessings. Christ, God’s true idea, makes these blessings practical in our individual experience through healing, transformation, and reformation. 

We come to a Christmas service to celebrate, like the wise men, the birth of Jesus—the highest proof of the ineffable love of God for humanity.

We come to a Christmas service to celebrate, like the wise men, the birth of Jesus, God’s beloved Son—the highest proof of the ineffable love of God for humanity. The Christ, for whom Christmas is named, is God’s greatest gift. And as our worship becomes more spiritual, more heartfelt, we demonstrate the Christ practically. It comforts those for whom the Christmas season may be tinged with sadness, tempers the frivolity that beclouds common sense, heartens the faltering will, brings resolution to human problems, frees us from sinful traits, transforms character, and heals the sick. 

Spiritual worship makes us cherish the gift of the Christ more than the bright wrapping of the festivities. It exalts God, dispelling thoughts that pull us downward to sin, sickness, and mortality. Mrs. Eddy describes the difference this way: “Christmas to me is the reminder of God’s great gift,—His spiritual idea, man and the universe,—a gift which so transcends mortal, material, sensual giving that the merriment, mad ambition, rivalry, and ritual of our common Christmas seem a human mockery in mimicry of the real worship in commemoration of Christ’s coming” (The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 262). 

Regardless of the season, services in Churches of Christ, Scientist, focus on spiritual worship and have healing results. Members joyfully attest to this in publications such as this one and at weekly testimony meetings. Spiritual worship does not diminish the joy and fellowship that the Christmas season brings, but shows it to be a season that heralds the reappearing of the ever-present Christ, Truth, as it dawns more clearly in human thought.

The Christ is present not just during the Christmas season, of course. At every moment, God’s divine message, Christ, is speaking to every listening ear, guiding our thoughts, enabling us to feel God’s love, and blessing us in practical ways. We tabernacle with God in our hearts—worshiping Him “in spirit and in truth”; yet, like the wise men who came to Bethlehem to worship the Christ child, we can express our adoration for God by coming to church whenever and as often as we can, expectant of blessings, comfort, and healing, just as so many do the world over on Christmas Day.

Moji George, Associate Editor