Advent Sunday 2023 St Andrew’s Milngavie
Today we welcomed Hugh to play for us as we celebrated Advent Sunday which marks the beginning of our spiritual preparation for Christmas and the beginning of the church’s year.
This evening we are sharing an Advent Carol Service with All Saints. It’s at All Saints at 5pm – all very welcome.Don’t forget Sunday 11th December 4pm Milngavie Choir Christmas Concert at St Joseph’s – tickets available on the door, do please come and support and bring your friends!
This Week
Tuesday 10am – Prayer Group in the Garden Room
Thursday 10am – Said Holy Communion followed by coffee in Friendship House.
Thursday 3pm – Advent Course, All Saints, all invited, not too late to join in.
Sunday 4pm – Milngavie Christmas Concert St Joseph’s tickets available on the door.
Readings for next Sunday – Second Sunday of Advent Isaiah 40:1-11 2 Peter 3:8-15 Mark 1:1-8
Today’s readings – Isaiah 64:1-9, 1 Corinthians 1:3-9, Mark 13:24-37
Our advent study this year centres around the theme of waiting. Paula Gooder, the theologian and author of the course, encourages us to explore what it means to wait for something and reflect on our attitude to waiting and how we can use waiting time effectively not only in a practical sense but also as a time of emotional and spiritual growth.
It can sometimes be hard to hang on to this sense of waiting and spiritual anticipation when all around us the trappings of Christmas and a different sort of waiting, longing and preparation are taking place.
A good place to concentrate the mind during Advent is in the scriptures. So lets have a look at today’s scripture.“Be on guard! Be alert! You do not know when that time will come” Mark 1:33 Jesus tells us in Mark chapter one – but what is he talking about?
What time will come? Do we really understand what we need to be alert to and on our guard for? Do we actually know in our hearts and souls what or who it is we are waiting for; longing for; preparing for?
It can be easy to tie ourselves up into knots over Advent texts concerning end times. So perhaps the best thing is to turn our minds to the beginning of St John’s gospel and reflect on those magical words that tell us all we really need to know “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us” John 1:14
That tiny baby in a manger who we worship at Christmas is the word made flesh. Illustrated in the words from that much loved hymn “O little town of Bethlehem” “The hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight. For Christ is born of Mary”.
We’re waiting to celebrate the birth of Jesus, who will be Christ the King. But it is for Christ the King’s return that we are to wait and prepare ourselves for at all times.
So, it is in this tiny, vulnerable baby and the man he will be that the hopes and fears of all our years will be met. And this is what the prophet Isaiah has said of him: “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.” Isaiah 9:6
Years later Jesus, using the same prophet Isaiah’s words will say of himself:
‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me
to proclaim release to the captives
and recovery of sight to the blind,
to let the oppressed go free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.’ Luke 4:18-19
These are descriptions of what, or rather who, we are waiting, longing and preparing for especially during Advent. And all this waiting, longing and preparing is underpinned by hope and the promises of God to his people.
In one sense that hope and promise is fulfilled as Jesus is born. He is the promised Christ who will save his people. And there is no possibility that he will fail. “The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this” proclaims Isaiah. Isaiah 9:7
But in another sense that hope and promise have yet to be fully realised. God’s Kingdom is not yet established in our world today.
And this is where we come in. We don’t know when or how Christ the King will return. But Jesus says that doesn’t matter – our job is to be ready, doing what God has called us to do, being part of anything that helps to establish the kingdom of God both in our own lives and in the lives of others.
We might say that, like Jesus, we are anointed to bring good news to the poor; sent to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind; sent to let the oppressed go free and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.’
And Jesus, in whom the Word becomes flesh shows us what a life looks like when it’s lived true to this calling and anointing. In him we see Love in action, albeit often tough love, and the difference that makes to people’s lives when they encounter it.
What he does we are called to do, with his help through the Holy Spirit. Our waiting, longing and preparing is about doing what the longed-for Christ would do to bring about the establishment of God’s Kingdom on earth.
When we see the state of the world today, surely we do long for the rule of a wise and insightful Counsellor; the rule of a God with the power and might to put an end to human misery but who is also loving and will protect and provide for his people; the rule of a Prince of Peace who will bring about reconciliation and peace between peoples and nations divided between and within themselves?
And in the face of all the damage and ugliness inflicted by men and women on each other and our world down the centuries, surely we also long for a world in which
hatred is replaced with love
harm by forgiveness
despair by hope sadness by joy
and where, in our own battered hearts and minds, we find love, forgiveness, understanding, consolation and new eternal life?