The angels returned to heaven and the shepherds decided to go to Bethlehem. They found Mary and Joseph and saw the baby lying in the manger. The shepherds returned, awe and in praising God for all they had heard and seen.
Luke 2:15-18
Dear Siblings in Christ,
As a child and young teen, I don’t recall ever learning about Advent as the time ahead of Christmas – but I definitely remember it being the waiting period before Christmas. I feel blessed to have siblings who can help me remember particular things about the Advent and Christmas season in our school, neighborhood, church, and home. Sometimes their recollections ‘correct’ mine, especially my older siblings’ recollections. I have no recollections of difficult or painful times around Advent and Christmas which, having shared and heard Christmas stories from friends and parishioners deepens my appreciation for my memories. The Advent and Christmas season can be a time of bittersweetness or challenges for some of our friends and family. Some of us might even have our own uneasy feelings about it but not necessarily know exactly why.
We hope this year’s Advent and Christmas worship theme helps heal and bridge some of those feeling with healing, hope, joy and love. We are leaning into the well-known Dickens’ story A Christmas Carol about a terribly sad, bitter and grumpy man’s (Scrooge) life changing experiences through looking back into his past that shaped his present and impacts his future, as well as those who care for him and with whom he is in community.
Each Sunday during Advent we journey with Scrooge and the ghosts of Christmases past, present and future exploring how our past impacts our actions and interactions in the present and influences the effects of our actions and others in the future. With the reflections from Matt Rawle’s book, The Redemption of Scrooge, we also explore how not only is Scrooge redeemed, but we too can be redeemed. Like Scrooge, we have a choice, every day, on how to live, give, love, forgive, and engage in the world.
We also want to help you spread the experience of joy, hope and love to others who are challenged to do so on their own. We want to suggest, first, that, if you have toys that your kids or grandkids are not playing with any longer, taken them early in the Advent season to a second-hand store so that families might purchase them to give to their own children as Christmas presents.
Second, our Advent and Christmas seasons offering will go towards gift cards for foster youth in Alameda and Contra Costa Counties. We learned in prior years that while younger foster kids will get toys and gifts, often the youth, especially those nearing adulthood are overlooked. By getting gift cards for them, they receive ‘double-joy’ – one in receiving the gift and one when they get to choose something they really want. If you want to purchase the gift cards yourself, please purchase $25 gift cards which they can use readily, e.g., Target, Visa/MC, Amazon, etc. You can place them in the offering basket at worship. (If you require a receipt for physical gift card(s) given, please include your name and email or address in the envelope). If you must mail them to us, it is a good idea to use postal insurance. If you prefer for us to buy the gift cards, monetary donations are welcome too.
You can also bring them or your Christmas offering to Christmas Eve worship at 7:00 pm, on December 24. We will share in the faith-filled story-telling, singing Christmas carols and decorating the Sanctuary Christmas Tree with ornaments. You can bring your own to add to those others have given, or place the ones we have on the tree. We will then close with the joyful and sacred candle-lighting and singing Silent Night together.
I pray and hope that the sacredness of peace, hope, love and joy will be deeply infused in your being and in all you do this Advent and Christmas season. Blessings and Merry Christmas to you all.
Salaam, Shalom,
Rev. Pamela Kurtz, Pastor
