Advent . Introduction
Happy new year, Advent Sunday is the first day of a new church year. There are two aspects of Advent. Advent is about looking forward to Jesus' first coming to earth (his birth in Bethlehem) and his second coming to earth, which is in the future.
The first is the nice side. In these four weeks before Christmas, we read the prophecies of how God promised to send a Saviour, and like any family looking forward to the birth of a new child – we as a Christian family, wherever you may be, can begin to prepare for the nativity.
The second is not so nice! It is not the manger babe, not parables, not miracles but Apocalyptic - to do with end times, our Lord's second coming - day of judgement. It is sombre stuff.
This Advent, our world may be in mid-Covid darkness, but we saw 2000 years ago what God does when the world is in darkness - not floods, not plagues, not supernatural fireworks. What God does when the world is a mess is he sends a child to the Middle East. A child, unwanted vulnerable. A child (the light of the world), easily loved by some who came to worship and adore him. But also easily ignored by those who wish to ignore him, even hurt him. God chose to take on our human life to put in motion the greatest rescue plan ever - Salvation. And this Advent, we can look to both part one and part two of salvation.
Part One: the baby in the manger and Part Two, the second coming. God says to each one of us, this is your choice this Advent:
Ignore me or Love me. What's it to be?
This Advent, I invite you to discover depths it's easy to miss in the tinsel and turkey and chocolate squares in our advent calendars. I will record Advent focused talks weekly leading up to Christmas day and beyond to Epiphanytide.
