Home > Advent Blog 2023

Things That Matter

December 12, 2023

I keep thinking about Jonathan’s sermon from Sunday, Nov. 26th. If you missed it, go to YouTube… Watch… Listen… REALLY LISTEN… I know… I know… Jonathan’s sermon wasn’t an ADVENT sermon… It wasn’t Advent yet, BUT… Here’s what I got out of it & why I can’t stop thinking about it, Before… During… and undoubtedly AFTER Advent…

WE are all in this together. It’s not about ME… It’s about US.

WE – together – walk the walk…

WE – together – are transformed…

WE – together – are healed & heal each other…

WE – together PREPARE the WAY of the LORD…

What an enormous relief!!!  I don’t have to do this alone!!! None of us have to do any of it alone!!!

You & I know that Advent is the season before Christmas. Christmas = Jesus’ birthday

Jesus = GOD in a human body

Jesus = Proof that GOD is so much more than invisible…

Proof that God didn’t just create us & then leave us on our own, like some sort of science experiment.

Joan Chittister says that what Advent is trying to teach us is “to see what is behind the apparent.  Advent makes us look for God in all those places we have, until now, ignored… (The Liturgical Year: The spiraling adventure of the Spiritual Life, p.59). The function of Advent is to remind us what we’re waiting for as we go through life too busy with things that do not matter to remember the things that do.  Advent relieves us of our commitment to the frenetic in a fast-paced world.  It slows us down.  It makes us think.” (p. 61)

I would only add this:  Advent – if we will let it – makes us remember who WE are AND WHY WE ARE HERE.

Pam Gregory