Welcome to Christ Church, New Mill, and especially to this celebration of the Nativity of our Lord in words and music.  You are invited to stand and join in the items marked "HYMN", and sit or kneel as appropriate for the other items.  We hope you enjoy the service.

The service starts with the dimming of the lights.

CAROL:  from The Wexford Carol.  (Irish trad.)
Good people all, this Christmas-time,
Consider well and bear in mind
What our good God for us has done,
In sending his beloved Son.
With Mary holy we should pray
To God with love this Christmas Day;
In Bethlehem upon that morn
There was a blessed Messiah born.

READING:  Genesis 1:1, 26-28, 31
The Creation.

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

God said, "Let us make mankind in our image, after our likeness, so they may rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move on the earth."
God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them, male and female he created them.
God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply! Fill the earth and subdue it! Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that moves on the ground.

God saw all that he had made--and it was very good.