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| Enjoying the church's new nativity during the first Sunday of Advent |
In keeping with the Advent theme of simplicity, waiting, and reflecting, we are simply going to include an Advent reflection which has touched us---and we are going to encourage us all to reflect on those things that really matter---such as glory, grace and truth--priceless things which money cannot buy but which God offers freely and in abundance!! Here's the reflection----
Locating our lives in the abandoned places of the empire
Everything in our society teaches us to move away from suffering, to
move out of neighborhoods where there is high crime, to move away from people
who don’t look like us. But the the
gospel calls us to something altogether different. We are to laugh at fear, to lean into
suffering, to open ourselves to the stranger.
Advent is the season when we remember how Jesus put on flesh and moved
into the neighborhood. God getting born
in a barn reminds us that God shows up in the most forsaken corners of the
earth.
Movements throughout church history have gone to the desert, to the
slums, to the most difficult places on earth to follow Jesus. For some of us that means remaining in
difficult neighborhoods that we were born into even though folks may think we
are crazy for not moving out. For others
it means returning to a difficult neighborhood after heading off to college or
job training to acquire skills---choosing to bring those skills back to where
we came from to help restore the broken streets. And for others it may mean relocating our
lives from places of so-called privilege to an abandoned place to offer our
gifts for God’s kingdom.
Wherever we come from, Jesus teaches us that good can happen where we
are, even if real-estate agents and politicians aren’t interested in our
neighborhoods. Jesus comes from
Nazareth, a town from which folks said nothing good could come. He knew suffering from the moment he entered
the world as a baby refugee born in the middle of a genocide. Jesus knew poverty and pain until he was
tortured and executed on a Roman cross.
This is the Jesus we are called to follow. With his coming we learn that the most
dangerous place for Christians to be is in comfort and safety, detached from
the suffering of others. Places that are
physically safe can be spiritually deadly.
Please take a look at the right-hand side panel for other news and prayer requests. We are so grateful for your love, prayers, encouragement and support. Please know that you are especially in our hearts and prayers during this beautiful season.
By God's grace and for His glory,
The Dave Schwulst family