Welcome to St. Augustine’s this Christmas.  It’s our hope that each one of you would come to know the same great joy that the shepherds knew that first Christmas night; that like them your fear would turn to rejoicing; that you too would hear the good news of glad tidings that the God of all creation has declared his everlasting good will toward men, that he himself is our peace, that his very name is Immanuel, God-with-us, the God who came this holy night to forever be with us and for us in our flesh and blood, our poverty, our hopes and fears, our loneliness, our need, our rejoicing, our dear shabby sorry little corner of creation that matters so much to the eternal Almighty God that he emptied himself of everything except love to be born here among us in a barn, a poor boy reaching out his arms for his mother, and for you, and for me.