Beloved,

Hard to conceive of the closeness of Christmas, when our music director comes to evening meetings in shorts.

Hard to conceive of the bigness of Advent, when we’re so mired in the humble daily, in scheduling parties and extra rehearsals, making little gifts, getting term papers and projects packed away to make soft space around the holidays for rest. How does one be a human making our way through the day, while simultaneously expecting the coming of Christ–both the first coming, Christmas, not to mention the second coming, the Apocalypse?

Bet most of you didn’t know that Apocalypse was an integral part of Advent worship, did you? It’s a word that strikes fear in our hearts, but it needn’t. It’s short for apokalupsis eschaton from the Greek, meaning “the revelation at the end of the age.” The name itself is neutral:  it doesn’t say anything about the end being especially bad, nor anything about it being especially good. All we have to go on to make sense of the Apocalypse, biblically speaking, is slim:  a few verses here and there, that charismatic preachers and wingnuts have made much of over the millenia. And what is there, in the Bible, offers more hope and promise than desolation and destruction, depending on the reading.

What do you hope for from the end-times? Can you even imagine it, or is it hard to think past next Thursday?

In keeping with our ‘Savior of the Cosmos and a Tiny Little Baby’ theme for Advent, I’ll be preaching this weekend from Luke 3, and what the Baptist’s words might mean that “…all flesh shall see the salvation of God.” Jeff is our able liturgist, John solos, Laura Ruth prays with us. We’ll take communion together, and we’ll bless our new handbells!

After worship: bell choir rehearsal; Rooftop People (all are welcome!), Compassionate Caregivers, cantata rehearsal, cookie-baking in the kitchen for our elders, or lovely lingering over coffee with friends in our sunny parish hall.

Get the sun on your face today. The darkness is still increasing, until the Light comes to shine in that darkness.

Christlove,
Molly