Longing for Jesus
Elaine Poproski Download: Audio
Sunday Reflection
Read Heather Weir’s reflection, titled, “Jesus and the Christmas Lights” from Sunday’s worship service. You’ll find it in the Sunday Reflections blog.
Sermon Note:
There wasn’t a sermon this week. Instead, the whole worship service revolved around the themes of Advent and Communion. The brief audio from this week comes from the words spoken introducing the hope of Advent.
Scripture Reading: Isaiah 2:2 – 5 (NRSV)
In days to come the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be raised above the hills; all the nations shall stream to it. Read more…
Looking to Sunday
by Elaine Poproski
Advent is about waiting. It’s about waiting for Christmas – doing all the shopping and baking, opening daily windows in the advent calendar, counting down to travel plans, either bracing for or looking forward to extended family time (depending on your family), creating and sending cards and letters…Colourful lights, decorated greenery, jingling bells, eggnog and gingerbread all greet the senses in increasing frequency as the weeks of advent progress tirelessly toward Christmas.
But there’s another layer to Advent – an overlaying of meaning to the season that is much bigger, and ultimately way more important, than the annual season of preparation for Christmas. That’s because Christmas isn’t an end in itself. In fact, Christmas is the beginning of something. Christmas – the annual reminder that God loves us so much He became one of us, allowed Himself to become an infant raised by fallible human parents, to live a life fully immersed in the human experience, and ultimately to die at the hands of other fallible human beings – is the beginning of God’s new work in the world, saving the world from sin and death. Advent is about waiting, not just for Christmas, but for that day when God’s kingdom will be the only kingdom left standing. When the prayer, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven, has been granted.
Advent is about celebrations and parties, but it’s also about grief and lament and longing. In the midst of Christmas lights twinkling in the dark, we remember that our world is still a place in which darkness thrives and injustice often prevails. We long for hope in our despair, for peace in our violence and hate, for joy in our griefs, and for love in our loneliness and isolation. And we cling to the promise of Christmas that God is addressing all those longings.
As you prepare for Sunday, I invite you to name your longings. In your life and in the world at large, what change do you long for? Where do you need hope? In what corner is the darkness more powerful than the light? How might your church family be light in the midst of your darkness?