Who Attends a Christmas Eve Service?

Posted by Adam Fix on January 5, 2009

My Sunday morning schedule looks something like this:

8-9am Set-up and preparation

9-10am Classes and Small Groups

10:15am Prayer with the pastors and the worship team before the service

10:30am Worship Service

Because we hold Sunday School classes and small groups before our worship service, many of our members are already in the building and preparing to worship before I have a chance to greet them.  Even through a consciece effort to make the rounds and greet people, I rarely hit even half of those in attendance.  However, on Christmas Eve, I made it a point to stand at the door and greet everyone as they entered.  It was so strange, despite the fact that we had an attendance comparable to a normal Sunday, I did not know half of the people who attended our Christmas Eve service.

For me, this raises two questions: who are all of these people coming on Christmas Eve and where are all the people who are usually here.  It also brings into question how we plan our Christmas service and what it should be like.  In any case, I couldn’t decide whether to be encouraged by all the new faces or discouraged because many of our regular attenders were not present.

Who attends your Christmas services and how do you plan accordingly?