Today’s Readings: Luke 3:1-6
In my article for the church’s monthly newsletter FOCUS, I talked about the various ways we prepare for the arrival of Christmas. I talked about our tendency to focus the bulk of our energy on things that are not necessarily spiritual. For example, we can spend the bulk of our time decorating our homes for parties, baking goods for social gatherings, and shopping for presents – all the while neglecting our spiritual lives. My invitation was for individuals to devote more time and energy getting spiritually ready for the arrival of the Christ-child. I even made a few suggestions for how they might do that.
Most of my suggestions involved activities individuals could “do” in order to get ready. In reflecting on the article, however, I realized I made an important mistake: I forgot to encourage folks to create times of silence in their lives that can be used for times of prayer and meditation. This is some of the most important work we can do in terms of preparing our hearts for the arrival of that Christ-child.
During our worship experience this morning, we are blessed to have a professional artist from within our community use a piece of her artwork to invite us into this quiet, contemplative place. I’m anxious to see how folks respond to this heartfelt invitation from the artist.
Today, I would encourage you to think about doing the same thing in your spiritual life – increase your times of silence in the days leading up to Christmas. May this time of silence slow you down and create room in your life for that still small voice that is encouraging you on your Advent journey toward that humble manger in Bethlehem. Til next time…
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1 comment:
i also like to think about, during the holiday season, that my action is for others and take joy in that. i think too much action in our lives is done out of necessity rather than out of love. it is when we are preparing our homes for the season of giving that we can take time to feel the joy of action and try to carry that into our day to day life by finding and bringing meaning to our daily actions.
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