Week 1 Saturday — Simply Christmas: An Advent Experience
SATURDAY
DAILY PSALM
Be exalted, O LORD, in your strength; we will sing and praise your might.
Psalm 21:13
CONNECTION
REFLECTION ON THE WEEK TOGETHER1
Where did you see God this week?
What did you learn about hope this week?
How did you practice being a light of hope this week?
FAMILY DEVOTIONS
Light the Advent Candle Gospel Reading: Matt. 22:15-22
HOPE IN THE GIVER OF LIFE
In our country, the holiday season is kicked off by Black Friday consumeristic deals, and it continues throughout the season. There are certain practices that are typical of our society — we use Christmas trees, lights, and ornaments to decorate our homes. We bake certain foods and we do different activities. We shop more than we normally would, and we sing songs that are only typical of this time of year.
Today’s gospel passage talks about a similar thing in the culture of Jesus’ day. During Jesus’ life, the Roman government was occupying the land, and all the Jewish citizens were required to pay certain taxes to Caesar, even though most of the Jews only begrudgingly did so, because as God’s chosen people it seemed to them that they shouldn’t have to serve another ruler who did not serve God. So the religious leaders are trying to trap Jesus, asking him a trick question about what people of the day should do about paying Roman taxes.
Jesus is not trapped by this question, though, because he distinguishes between cultural customs and God’s customs. He says to give Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God. Caesar was the determiner of the culture of the day, but God is the determiner and giver of life.
In this season, as we engage in our culture, take the time and reflection to make sure you’re only giving the culture what belongs to it, but make sure that your heart and mind remain with the God they belong to. It’s neither good nor bad to engage in the gift giving and the decorating, but this season of Advent is also the time to give to God what belongs to God.
What have you given yourself to this week?
PRAYER
Lord Jesus, the Advent candle burns with hope. Its faint glow serves to remind us that we share the hope the prophets held – that you will return in time. We long for the day your light will pierce the darkness.1
AMEN
Notes:
1)Adapted from Paul Sheneman, Illuminate: an Advent Experience. Kansas City, MO: Beacon Hill of Kansas City, 2011. Print.
Week 1 Friday — Simply Christmas: An Advent Experience
FRIDAY
DAILY PSALM
Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will rest secure, because you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see decay. You have made known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand.
Psalm 16:9-11
CONNECTION
SYMBOLS OF THE SEASON – CANDLE
The candle has long been a symbol of Christ, the Light of the World, even before the observance of Advent. The practice of using a candle to symbolize Christ probably came from the use of light as a metaphor for Jesus in the New Testament. The candle is also a great reminder to us during Advent that a part of our preparation is to spread the light of hope to our world.1
FAMILY DEVOTIONS
Light the Advent Candle Gospel Reading: Matt. 22:1-14
HOPE IN THE WARNING
The story the Jesus tells in today’s gospel reading is more of a warning than a story. In this season of Advent, we have received an invitation to prepare ourselves to celebrate the coming of a King – Jesus. Just like the people in the story, all of us have been invited to this joyous celebration, but the thing is that not everyone will accept the invitation. Others will receive the invitation, store it away, meaning to RSVP, meaning to prepare themselves, but on the day of the celebration, they will find that they have pushed it off for the sake of other things, and when they do arrive, they will not be allowed to stay, because they have not really entered into the meaning of the true celebration of the King.
But Jesus is clear: those that receive the invitation, that prepare themselves and await the King and are ready to celebrate when the time comes, they will be welcomed into the festivities and will be able to fully engage in what a joyful thing it truly is.
This is a hopeful word for us as we prepare ourselves not only to celebrate Jesus’ birth, but as we prepare for His second coming. The good news is that Advent has just begun, and there is time for us to begin now, preparing ourselves, looking forward to Jesus’ presence among us, and becoming His hands and feet of hope to our community in the meantime.
The hope that we have in this warning is that it hasn’t happened yet, and it’s not too late for any of us to prepare ourselves to enter into God’s story, and to prepare ourselves to celebrate in His continued divine plan to bring us back to Him. Let us prepare ourselves, and let us seek Him.
PRAYER
O Christ, our true and only Light, illumine those who sit in night.5
AMEN
Notes:
1)Adapted from Paul Sheneman, Illuminate: an Advent Experience. Kansas City, MO: Beacon Hill of Kansas City, 2011. Print.
5)Adapted from Johann Heerman, “O Christ, Our True and Only Light” (1630), trans. Catherine Winkworth (1858), Cyber Hymnal, http://www.hymntime.com/tch/htm/o/c/ocotruea.htm.
Week 1 Thursday — Simply Christmas: An Advent Experience
THURSDAY
DAILY PSALM
I love you, O LORD, my strength. The LORD is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge. He is my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.
Psalm 18:1-2
CONNECTION
FAMILY STORIES OF HOPE
Today, connect your family stories to this week’s Advent theme of hope. Think about how you can begin sharing your family stories of hope in God.
ENGAGE
Have everyone in your family write down three things that they hope for. These are not Christmas lists, but rather big things that they hope God can do in your life or in the lives of those you know. Once you’ve all written down your three things, take turns sharing with one another what you hope for, and then praying for one another’s hopes.
DISCUSS
What does hope feel like?
What is a hope you had that has been fulfilled?
How has hope in God helped you in hard times?
FAMILY DEVOTIONS
Light the Advent Candle Gospel Reading: Matt. 21:33-46
HOPE IN THE RESPONSIBILITY
In these days leading up to Christmas, we all have several responsibilities that seem to stack up on our shoulders. If it’s not buying gifts and hosting or showing up to social gatherings, it’s cooking, cleaning, or simply managing the household as the kids are out of school. Sometimes even the fun and good things of the season, like decorating and taking part in the various family traditions, can seem to become responsibilities instead of joyful events. It’s ironic how our “preparations” for the Christmas season can even keep our hearts and minds from preparing for what Christmas is really about.
Jesus tells the story of a master who leaves his land to tenants while he goes away, and about how those tenants ultimately take what they were given and go against the master. The scripture tells us that the religious leaders of the day knew Jesus was talking about them. He was saying that the responsibilities that God had given to them were going to be taken away and given to others because they had forgotten why those responsibilities were given to them – to serve God, and to love others with His same kind of love. They had gotten so caught up in the what they felt like they were supposed to and had to do, that they forgot that it was really a joy and an honor to be given the opportunity to partner with God like they had.
Jesus says that He is going to give the responsibility to others. We, as we walk with God, believe who He says He is, and take joy in being His partners, can be those ‘others’. We get the chance to partner with God in bringing hope to an otherwise dreary world. And Advent is the perfect season to begin practicing the act of taking joy in these responsibilities that God graciously gives us.
PRAYER
O Son of God, we wait for you in love for your appearing. We know you sit on the throne, and we, your name, are bearing.4
AMEN
Notes:
4) Adapted from Phillip P. Hiller, “O Son of God, We Wait for Thee,” trans. Joseph A. Seiss (1890), Cyber Hymnal, http://www.hymntime.com/tch/htm/o/s/o/osonogod.htm.
Week 1 Wednesday — Simply Christmas: An Advent Experience
WEDNESDAY — HOPE
DAILY PSALM
Look on me and answer, O LORD my God. Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death.
Psalm 13:3
CONNECTION
THE SYMBOLISM OF THE ADVENT WREATH1
The circle of the Advent wreath is an endless loop and reminds us of the eternal and endless love of God. Remember back to the very beginning of our story with God. In the beginning, God created all things in heaven and on earth. God created man and woman in His image. God gave man and woman the task to care for the world.
They lived in the goodness of God’s creation with only one rule. They were told not to eat from one tree. They decided to break God’s rule, and that is when sin and death entered the world.
Now we wait and hope in God, whose love is endless. Sin and death are a part of our world, but we also know that God’s endless love has and will defeat them. So we wait in hope for the Light of God to come.
FAMILY DEVOTIONS
Light the Advent Candle Gospel Reading: Matt. 21:23-32
HOPE IN THE INVITATION
In today’s gospel passage, we find a good reminder that not all who look on our actions will find them meaningful. As we go about this season leading up to Christmas, we as Christians do some unusual things as far as the rest of the world is concerned. We give, not just to our own kids and families, but to strangers, sometimes even strangers who live somewhere else in the world. We also show up on doorsteps and sing songs to strangers. Most of the people in our culture are familiar with the ritual of caroling, but some may still not welcome it. We also do strange things like reenacting the birth of a poor baby who was born 2,000 years ago. Not only do we reenact His birth, but we sing songs to Him. And we read this book, the Bible, and we light candles and pray together.
Jesus was doing many similar things in this time in His life – not because it was the Advent season, but because He was Jesus, and He showed us that we were made for many of these same things. We give to others because He gave to others. We offer up songs of praise because He taught us the importance of praising and honoring our Father in heaven.We pray and read the Bible because He did as well, and because we want to know more about His story so that when it comes to the point that onlookers of our lives begin to ask why we do what we do, we can tell them about the Lord who did them first. We do these things so that as we encounter hurting people in our world and find ourselves unable to heal them by our own power and take away their pain, we can point them to the God who heals.
In this scripture, we see Jesus confronted by people who did not want what He had to offer. They were offended and threatened by the hope He offered because it took away their power as the keepers of all hope for a better life. Jesus was going around offering this hope of healing and full life to anyone that would hear (even prostitutes and tax collectors!) and they are the ones who received it!
This should be a reminder and a challenge to us as we practice embodying hope to our community and explaining why we’re doing these things to those who wonder, that we should not withhold this message of hope from anyone who finds it meaningful. Rather, we should invite them into the story of God and the beautiful hope that it entails – no matter who they are. Jesus offered an open invitation. We should too.
PRAYER
The King shall come when morning dawns and light and beauty ring. Hail, Christ the Lord! Your people pray, come quickly, King of kings.3
AMEN
Notes:
1) Taken from Paul Sheneman, Illuminate: an Advent Experience. Kansas City, MO: Beacon Hill of Kansas City, 2011. Print.
3) Adapted from “The King Shall Come When Morning Dawns” (1907), author unknown, trans. John Brownlie, Cyber Hymnal, http://www.hymntime.com/tch/htm/k/l/kingcome.htm.
Week 1 Tuesday– Simply Christmas: An Advent Experience
TUESDAY — HOPE
DAILY PSALM
Give ear to my words, O Lord, consider my sighing. Listen to my cry for help, my King and my God, for to you I pray. In the morning, O Lord, you hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait in expectation.
Psalm 5:1-3
CONNECTION
HOPE PROJECTS
Are you ready to dive in and start embodying hope in our community? Below are some suggestions of ways that your friends and family can get involved and begin to share our hope with the community, and to embody that hope to those in need. Talk these ideas over together and decide on something that you can all do. Maybe you can even start a new tradition that can continue on for years to come.
HELP THE HOPE CENTER
Make a financial contribution to help them keep their ministry to our community running. Make checks payable to “OroNaz Church” with “Hope Center” written on the memo line. Put your donation into one of the envelopes in the back of the chairs at the worship service next sunday and then drop it into the offering.
Donate food and clothing to the Hope Center. Donations are graciously accepted Tues-Fri from 10 a.m. – 3 p.m. at 1950 Kitrick Ave, Bldg A, Oroville.
Contact them about volunteering your time to help their ministry keep going strong. For more information visit www.oroillehopecenter.org or call 538.8398
EXTEND YOUR FAMILY
Invite a friend or acquaintance who doesn’t have someone to celebrate with into your family for Advent and Christmas.1
SECRET YARD-KEEPER
Go out and rake your neighbor’s lawn. You can do it stealthily, but even if you get caught, it’ll still be a blessing to them.
FAMILY ADVENT WREATH
As a family, plan and shop for materials and make an Advent wreath together. Make it as simple or as complex as you want. Visit www.ehow.com/how_3562_make-advent-wreath.html for a simpler idea, or google “How to make Advent wreath” for more creative tips and ideas.
FAMILY DEVOTIONS
Light the Advent Candle Gospel Reading: Matt. 21:12-22
HOPE AND PRAY
The gospel passage for today is a reminder of what we have already acknowledged, that the world is a broken place. In the first part of the passage we see Jesus throwing people out of the temple courts because they are abusing what is meant to be a place of healing, worship, and purification. Later we see Him using His power to curse a tree that’s not doing what it was made to do – bear fruit.
These passages are good for us to think about in this time of year. Because we live in a broken world, it’s a given that all of our relationships with our friends and family are not necessarily as healthy as they should be. Many of us have broken relationships that carry with them lots of pain and resentment. The thing is, though, that we are made to be relational. We are made to do life with other people, just like a fig tree is made to bear fruit, and just as the temple is made to be a place of worship and sacrifice, not sales and scams.
As we continue on this Advent path, keep in mind that we believe and have faith and hope in a God who can restore us to what we were made for. In the middle of these two scenes of Jesus punishing the people and the tree for not doing what they were made for, we also see Him healing those who come to Him seeking help. As we are ready to become the healthy, relational people we were made to be, let us come to Jesus with our hope in His ability to heal our wounds in our relationships and to help us to forgive, and to try to move forward in love. It may not happen overnight, it may not even happen this year — but Jesus tells us the power of faith and hope in this scripture and He assures us that God has the ultimate power to do even what we think to be impossible. Let’s hope for the healing of our relationships and put our trust in God’s ability to help us live like we were made to live — in community with one another.
PRAYER
O LORD, we thank you for being a relational GOD, and we come to you seeking your healing. Heal us and make us new. Help us to forgive, so that we may be forgiven. Help us learn to love each other like You have loved us. We put our hope for health in You.
AMEN
Notes:
1) Adapted from Paul Sheneman, Illuminate: an Advent Experience. Kansas City, MO: Beacon Hill of Kansas City, 2011. Print.
Week 1 Monday– Simply Christmas: An Advent Experience
MONDAY
DAILY PSALM
I will give thank to the Lord because of his righteousness and will sing praise to the name of the LORD Most High.
Psalm 7:17
CONNECTION
HOPE
Our journey into Advent begins in darkness, embracing the fact that we don’t know when Christ will come. But we do have an inkling of light, the hope that maybe life doesn’t have to stay this way, the hope that one day all things will be made right and good once again.
But the thing about hope is that it is not often found in the good places. Hope is found among the broken people and places where everything seems to be different than it was supposed to be. When everything is fine and well, there is no need for hope, just as there is no need for light in an already lit place.
But our world is dark. There is much pain, and suffering, and brokenness. We live in a world with vast poverty, with disease epidemics, with genocides and slavery. We live in a town with divorce, disease, death, abuse, addiction, abandonment.
As Christians, our hope in Christ doesn’t ignore those facets of everyday life. But it does provide hope in a God who is good even when the world is not. We hope in a God who heals us after the world breaks us. We have a God who loves us, and wants to be near to us. That is what Advent starts with — with our glimmer of hope in the God who is still good despite our circumstances — the hope that He will be near to us now, and the hope that He will come again and restore everything to the way it’s supposed to be.
During our worship service yesterday we lit the prophets’ candle on the Advent wreath. That candle symbolizes this hope that has been present since God first sent word to His people about His plan to redeem everything back to goodness. This week, let’s focus on watching for that hope, and embodying that hope to others around us, telling the story of the good news that we have a God who is good.
FAMILY DEVOTIONS
Light the Advent Candle Gospel Reading: Matt. 21:1-11
HOPE IN THE GENTLE KING
Sometimes this time of year comes in ushered by busy-ness, chaos, and the demands of our culture and our consumeristic society only add to the stress. On top of the regular holiday stress, often times these holiday days are stressful times for families and relationships as well. Broken relationships are hard to ignore, struggling relations often struggle more, and what is meant to be a season of joy is often quickly transformed into a time of pain and conflict.
In the gospel passage for today, Jesus also faces a burden of a situation. We see Him entering into Jerusalem about to fulfill wonderful prophecies about liberation, but the things Jesus was saying and doing had severely offended and threatened the religious leaders of the day, making the situation very dangerous for Him.
But, even knowing this, we don’t see Jesus storming in, taking the city by force. By His divine nature, He knows that He has claim to this city, that He could come in with the force of the God He is, but He doesn’t. Neither does He try to slip in under the radar, thereby fulfilling some of the prophecies without endangering Himself. Instead, He comes in, confident in who He is and what He’s there for, confident about the good news He embodies, but He enters also with gentleness, not grandeur.
We are to do the same in the ways that we share the hope of Jesus with others — not to come by force, or to slip by unnoticed, but to come with confidence in what it is we have to share, and with gentleness.
PRAYER
Hosanna to the living Lord! Hosanna to the Incarnate Word! To Christ, Creator, Savior, King, let earth, let heaven, Hosanna ring!2
AMEN
Notes:
2) Adapted from Reginald Heber, “Hosanna to the Living Lord: (1811), Cyber Hymnal, http://www.hymntime.com/tch/htm/h/t/htliving.htm.
Week 1 Sunday — Simply Christmas: An Advent Experience
SUNDAY — HOPE
ADVENT SEASON WEEK ONE
THE UN-EMPTIED DISHWASHER
A Devotional Reflection on Mark 13:24-37
Of all the chores I had when I was younger, emptying the dishwasher was one of my least favorite. It wasn’t the hardest chore, and definitely didn’t take the longest, but for some reason, when I was asked to empty the dishwasher, I always put it off as long as possible. Soon, though, this turned into a trend that I began to be severely reprimanded for.
I can recall countless times when, on weekday afternoons when I was about eight or nine years old, my mother would be leaving the house to go run some errands. I would be watching an afternoon educational TV program, using up my allotted hour of TV time per day, and my mother would come into the room, purse on her shoulder, ready to walk out the door.
“I want you to empty the dishwasher, please. Make sure you do it before I get back. I’ll only be gone about 45 minutes.”
“Yes, Mom,” I’d say, good intentioned, yet half-distracted by the TV show still playing while I answered.
Inevitably, though, once my show was over, I’d totally haveforgotten my mother’s request, and I’d go on to do other things with my time. Even when she arrived home, I wouldn’t remember that I’d forgotten to obey, until she went into the kitchen and found the dishwasher still full of clean dishes, and would ask me why I hadn’t emptied them like I’d said I would.
She wasn’t just disappointed in me; she disciplined me because I hadn’t done what she asked me to do — I hadn’t done what I said I’d do, even though I meant to follow through.
What happened between my mother and me in these encounters is very similar to what Jesus is talking about in this gospel passage.
In the passage, Jesus is warning his disciples about the chaos that will come at the end of time and about his return to reign over the earth. But the disciples want to know when all of this is going to happen.
To try to explain it clearer Jesus tells the story of a master who is going away: “He leaves his house and puts his servants in charge, each with their assigned task, and tells the one at the door to keep watch. Therefore keep watch because you do not know when the owner of the house will come back—whether in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or at dawn. If he comes suddenly, do not let him find you sleeping” (v. 34b-36, NIV).
Just as I was found so many times by my mother, not having completed what she asked me to do, Jesus warns the disciples against the same sort of thing — but with God.
The bottom line is that we don’t know when Jesus is going to return, but we do know how He’s asked us to live in the meantime. We are like the servants in the parable who have been left to their assigned tasks, and told to be alert, waiting for the master’s return. It’s this balancing act of keeping our bodies and hearts busy here in the present, doing the things Jesus has asked of us, and keeping our minds and our souls looking for Jesus, waiting anxiously for His coming. Because He will come again, and it will be unexpected.
The Israelites of old were given the commandment to love God and to love their neighbors as they awaited the arrival of the Messiah, Jesus. We, too, are awaiting His arrival and we are left with the same commands. Except we have been given an additional commandment — to go out and make disciples. So not only do we need to live with Christ’s love flowing out of us, but we can let that love be a testament to the hope that we have in Jesus, and we can tell people about that hope that He offers to them, too.
So you see, our Advent journey isn’t just about reliving the road to Bethlehem and remembering the Christmas story. That’s part of it, but our journey through Advent begins with where we are now — waiting for our coming King, receiving the hope that He gives us, and embodying that hope in our community. Jesus’ birth was the beginning of God’s plan to bring us out of our sin and back to Him, but Jesus’ second coming will bring the total fulfillment of that plan. While our world is still a broken and painful place, part of Advent is celebrating that God still has a plan in place to make right everything that is wrong. And that is something to hope for and celebrate!
ADVENT THEME – THE PROPHETS’ CANDLE1
First Sunday of Advent
The first candle of Advent is the prophets’ candle, which symbolizes hope. As the prophets of Israel received from God messages of hope about His promise to heal and reclaim Israel, we also receive that message today. The flicker of a single flame reminds us that the Light of the World, Jesus, has already come. However, Jesus has not yet returned to complete the work He started. We wait and anticipate the second coming of the Son of God in order that the world may be rid of all darkness. Today, we are called to recognize the darkness and to hope in the Light.
Notes:
1) Adapted from Paul Sheneman, Illuminate: an Advent Experience. Kansas City, MO: Beacon Hill of Kansas City, 2011. Print.
Simply Christmas: An Advent Experience — Introduction
SIMPLY CHRISTMAS — AN ADVENT EXPERIENCE — WEEK ONE
A word from Pastor Dennis Day:
An Advent Experience…
SIMPLY CHRISTMAS
Greetings and welcome to the Advent Experience Devotional. We trust it will enhance and inspire your Advent experience this year. All of us look forward to celebrating the birth of our Savior on Christmas Day…but not all of us have experienced the rich traditions, good connections with others, or the simple eternal truths of Christmas of the past. It is our desire to share with our church body, in a fresh way, some of these rich experiences in a devotional form.
This guide is not supposed to be something that adds more stress to your season but, rather, it is a way that we can all slow down and go deeper into the true meaning of this wonderful celebration. You can do this as a family, as a life group, or as a group of friends together. Any way you choose to use this devotional will be great!
For some this time of year reminds you of times past that are no more…and so it can be painful. For others it is a time of great, spontaneous joy with kids and grandkids. However this season finds you, it is my prayer that you will extract every bit of joy and meaning from this Advent/Christmas season. So bring your family and friends together, or find a place of quietness yourself, and enter into a season of…SIMPLY CHRISTMAS.
-Pastor D
INTRODUCTION
For Christians, Advent marks the beginning of a new year. Churches follow what is called the “Christian calendar,” which takes us through various seasons during a year’s time, and Advent is the very first season of the Christian year.
Over two-thousand years ago, the people of Israel were looking forward to a person, called the Messiah, who was supposed to come and deliver them. They were oppressed by the rulers of the land, and they looked forward to a day when they would be freed, when the tables would be over-turned and they would rejoice in the fulfillment of the prophecies of this magnificent coming. They were looking for someone to save them. And then Jesus came — freeing them not from their current bondage, but from eternal bondage, offering a radically full life that will not fade.
During the four weeks leading up to Christmas, Advent is a distinct time of waiting and preparing, letting ourselves experience what Israel experienced as they waited and prepared for their savior to arrive. But it is not only a time of remembering and re-telling the Christmas story of how Christ came to earth, but also a time for us now, in the 21st century, to look forward with anticipation to when Christ will come again. We look forward in hope, just as Israel did. And we celebrate in Christ’s coming.
Advent isn’t just about waiting for the darkness of this world to end, though. It’s also about embodying the light of Christ, and helping to shine into the darkness of our world now. Thisseason is naturally about giving, and it is our joy and duty as Christians to shine Christ’s light as we do so. It’s possible to give without loving, but it’s impossible to love without giving.
So throughout these four weeks, let’s journey together, reflecting on the story of Christ’s first coming, looking forward to His second coming, and embodying his love and light to our community of Oroville in the meantime. In this journey of reflecting, waiting, hoping, and doing, we will experience the extraordinary joy that Christmas is meant to hold as the culmination of this process. We will see what a gift it truly is that God, in all His compassionate glory, came to us as a helpless babe two-thousand years ago, and that He will come again as our reigning King.
FAMILY DEVOTIONAL GUIDE
This guide is to be used in community. If you don’t live with a family, then maybe you can get together with other single people or with another family to go through this together. Either way though, in using this guide, you will be challenged to get out into the community in various ways. Part of the purpose of this devotional experience is to discover what sorts of things we were made for. One of the things we were made for is community, so don’t venture into this Advent journey alone.
Some of you may be familiar with the practices and traditions of advent while others of you may not be. That’s OK.
This weekly booklet will guide you through different practices like scripture reading and reflection, prayer, and it will explore two traditional aspects of the Christian Advent season: the
lighting of the Advent Wreath candles and the use of the Revised Common Lectionary. Both of these are adapted to be easy for you and your family to use and explore.
SUNDAY DEVOTIONS
The Sunday devotional sections are to allow your family to continue the spirit of worship even once you’ve left the Church building that morning. These sections will be based on the gospel reading for the day and will focus on the main theme of that scripture passage. These days are also where you will find the “Advent Theme” section, introducing each week’s candle from the Advent wreath and what it represents.
MONDAY-SATURDAY DEVOTIONS
The weekday devotions are broken up into sections. The first section, “Connection,” is a practical, daily way to help you apply the Advent candle’s theme to your everyday life. This section will encourage your family to connect in your community and to really live out this Advent experience outside of your devotional times.
The second sections is the “Family Devotion.” The gospel readings presented here are taken from the readings for Year Two of the “Daily Office Lectionary” in the Book of Common Prayer. Millions of people follow along through these scripture readings during this season and your family can reflect and go deeper into these well-known stories side-by-side with Christians all over the world.1
NOTES:
Adapted from Paul Sheneman, Illuminate: an Advent Experience. Kansas City, MO: Beacon Hill of Kansas City, 2011. Print.
Haiti part 3– Tuesday
Haiti trip account part 3: Tuesday
Tuesday was our first full day in Plaine Mapou, and also our first day of work. We began work at 5:30am, and we were divided into three teams: roofing, painting, and making benches. I was on the bench crew — cutting boards, cutting corners, routing, sanding, varnishing (two coats front and back), assembling the bottom boards and the legs, assembling the top board and the legs), for 93 benches in all.
We took a break for breakfast at 7:30am, and by then many of the community members were there at the church already having been there helping in various ways for the past hour. The roofing crew was mainly composed of people from our team, the leaders from the college (Frantz and Steve), and a few other Haitian men that Frantz had hired to come work with us on the project. However, the painting and bench crews both were swamped with more help from the community than we knew what to do with. It was amazing and somewhat overwhelming all at the same time.
There were some difficulties in working on these projects through cultural and language barriers, one of which resulted in both of our sanders we brought ending up burned out because we couldn’t get it communicated to those helping that they couldn’t press down so hard on them while sanding. Luckily, Haiti seems to be the land of creative, out-of-the-box thinking, and it rubbed off on us. Soon Destiny, who had been overseeing the sanding operation, had a whole team of little haitian boys helping her sand with small wood blocks with sand paper nailed to them. I’m pretty sure they ended up going through the boards even faster this way than with the power sanders anyway.
Just after lunch, we were beginning to do our second coat of varnish on the first side of many of the bench boards, and our first girl to come help with the construction came and held the paint tray for Lizzy and I as we walked along the side of the building where we had propped all the boards to dry. Her name is Ociana, and she is 20 years old. Once she appeared, it seemed like she never went away again until we left. Soon another girl, similar in age, named Jalin came to help as well. She would refill the paint tray from the varnish can, and help to flip the tall, 10-foot boards so we could varnish the part that was out of our reach. They spoke as much english as we spoke creole (Hello, How are you, my name is, etc.)so we worked in some silence together, occasionally playing the point-to-something-and-say-it-in-english-then-hear-what-it-is-in-Creole game. By the end of the day, though, I found myself keeping an eye out for both of those young women — eager to spend more time with them– even though I had nothing new to offer them in the way of words they’d understand.
The long and exhausting day of work was really a beautiful thing. There were a few times where young men would come up to help with what I was doing, but then they’d help so efficiently that I could walk away and they’d continue to do the job, so I took the opportunities to wander around the church, seeing how everyone else was working together, to see how the project was coming along, and to hear from haitians and americans alike about what they thought about what was happening there.
As I walked along the side of the church, the wall was filled with haitian men painting– cream colored paint splattered on their dark faces and arms and hands. One of them had attached a paint roller to the end of an incredibly long stick that would allow him to reach the top of the tall 15-20 foot wall with ease (ingenuity at its best).
I was interviewing one teenage boy, Kentor, and in response to my question of what he does in the town, he said he came to Church because he loves Jesus. I asked why he love Jesus, and he looked at me like it should be obvious: “Because he loves me, so I love him also.”
The younger people there all very much enjoyed having pictures taken of them, but anyone over the age of 7 or 8 posed in what they thought were extremely cool stances. They loved the sunglasses that the team members brought to wear while they worked, and most team members ended up giving their pairs away to various people in the church.
By the end of the first day, I had been asked countless times “You have children?” “No.” “You have boyfriend?” “No.” “How old are you?” “21.” “Oh… I am 16.” and they would relate to me fairly well.
Though, I did receive one serious proposal of marriage before I’d been in the town for even 24 hours. A guy named Whiskey asked all of those same questions, except in his case, he was 21 years old also… a fact he was VERY excited about (surely a sign from God). I felt bad for him as I was giving him instructions on how to help me varnish, interrupting his profession of crazy love for me. It was comical and also difficult to maneuver myself tactfully in the situation. With respect but firmness, I tried to explain to the young man with broken English about how he surely didn’t love me because he didn’t even know me. He looked crushed when I said I did not love him, and tried to explain what I believed about love. He assured me he wanted to be my boyfriend and become my wife (I also tried to teach him the word husband was for a man, but I don’t think he really caught what I was trying to say).
Before we left the college, Amanda, the wife of Steve, the leader that went with us, told us that Haitian boys loves american girls, and that some teams decide to pre-set who will be their “husband” or “boyfriend” for the trip, so that when they are asked this question, they can simply point and try to get out of the situation.
And as simple and innocent as it sounds, I found myself conflicted about lying about any such thing, especially in a community where we are really trying to come together as brothers and sisters. If I can’t tell the truth about simple things that will cause somewhat awkward situations, how much harder will it be to tell them the truth about the depths of my story, or to enter into a conflict with one of them later on in grace and truth? I found it necessary to be truthful about the small things like not having a boyfriend because I want to be all-in in this partnership. I want to be able to speak Creole and communicate better and to grow together not as two churches who kind of know each other, but as one church who just happens to live in two different places.
And, of course, it’s never a horrible thing to be proposed to, even if I didn’t agree.
By the end of the first day we had knocked out some SERIOUS work on the whole church project, and almost completed the benches in total, and the painting was nearly done as well. The community had been such a help in making all of that happen.
Before we left the college, Steve and Frantz had told us the amount of time we’d be spending in Plaine Mapou, and we were planning on working there on the project MOnday afternoon, all day Tuesday, and half the day Wednesday and then have the dedication service later Wednesday afternoon. But when it took us until almost dark to get there Monday, at least for me, I began to worry about whether we’d be able to finish the project, and about whether we’d be able to do both that AND form relationships in the community. But by the end of Tuesday, it was clear that because of the open-hearts of the community that welcomed us, and the willingness to work that they had, we were able to do both without any problems, and to do them better than I had ever imagined.
Everyone slept well the second night. The exhaustion couldn’t be fought.
Haiti: Part 2 — Monday
Haiti trip account part 2:
Day 2: Monday
We left from the college early in the morning and drove through more urban area on our way to the dock where we needed to catch to ferry. The scene was overwhelmingly crowded with people: people on the side of the road walking, people in the back of crowded tap taps, overflowing with bodies. People selling chickens. People selling medicine pills. People selling water. People selling flip flops. People talking. People yelling. People running across the street. People in front of their concrete shackish homes. People driving. People honking. Life was going in full-force while we drove, rubble around them, poverty encompassing them, an we literally just drove through it all with our doors locked, our windows up, and taking discrete pictures when we saw things we either couldn’t believe or needed desperately to believe.
As we finally left the clogged, sprawling, crawling urban area, we burst forth into free land, and dotting the open hill-sides were still many tents where people were living — tents made of blue tarps, white tarps inscribed “USAid — Courtesy of the American People”, random boards, and a few pieces of sheet metal. I don’t know how I feel with being associated with the white tarps that still exist as inadequate lodging for tens of thousands of people in Haiti over a year after the earthquake. It does provide covering that may not have been there otherwise, but a white tarp? Really? Is that courtesy? Is that compassion? Is that the sharing of wealth and blessing? Yes, when there is nothing else to offer, but Haiti needs much more than a new batch of tarps.
We got to the dock, and I saw the most beautiful boat I’ve ever seen (not the ferry we took, but a big wooden ship with sails that was docked there as well). (If you don’t know this about me — I love sail boats and sailed ships, and I was blessed to see many such boats cruising the waters throughout our time around the water through the next few days.) The dock for the ferry was as hectic as the area we waited in outside the airport. Many men were there looking for work, driven by desperation, ready to serve in the hopes of earning a bit for their services. finally we did all get crowded onto the benches along the sides of the ferry, and all of our equipment and luggage got loaded and secured. The ride took longer than any of us had really anticipated, and was a solid two hours if not more that we spent there, sitting squished next to one another and our haitian boat-neighbors. The man next to me eventually asked if we spoke spanish, and I felt myself come totally awake and begin to engage. I hadn’t realized until that moment how much not being able to communicate makes me lack energy. I had been sleeping through part of the ride (thoroughly sleeping–head fallen back, mouth wide open type of situation) and this man, in spanish, began to tattle-tale on my lovely friends, Destiny and Lizzy who had so kindly taken a picture of me while asleep. It was fun to get to speak with him in real words that I knew (even if they weren’t in my primary language) rather than having to resort to the charades game continually.
When we got to the dock, we went through the unloading and loading of ALL of our things yet again — this time into a large open-topped cage truck. The pastor of the community we were heading to (Pastor Revoy Lindor of Plaine Mapou Church of the Nazarene) met us at the dock and rode all the way back with us also — something he did NOT have to do, but simply shows his excitement and commitment to this partnership as well.
The truck ride to Plaine Mapou was an experience. It took somewhere around 3 hours, and most of the team was piled into the back half of the truck bed, standing up, trying to hold onto the edges, and eventually some of them tried to sit and not fall on the others. Myself, our W&W leader, Steve, and a couple of the other girls were piled in the front half of the truck bed atop all of our luggage and equipment — making us sit at about the same height as the top of the cab of this large truck. Our height is what caused the problem of branches — or rather, the problem of having to DODGE the branches along this bumpy, hilly, pot-hole-filled, three-hour-long dirt road. About 15 minutes into the ride, as we were all trying to dodge the branches, we learned that some of the branches have thorns…
Between falling in-between suitcases and sinking into inhumane position within the luggage pile, falling on one another, and being in the face, arms, neck, torso with branches, we finally arrived in Plaine Mapou, and as we drove up, the church members were standing in front of the church, waiting in anticipation of our arrival, and as soon as we were within their sight, they began dancing and singing– praising God and simultaneously welcoming us into their lives. those of us did not jump, sing or dance (partly because of our crowded placement in the truck, partly because of uncertainty and difference in culture), but we recognized the significance of that beginning moment as we drove up and realized that this was the beginning of something that can be truly beautiful in the sight of God. We didn’t know the people before us — didn’t know their names, faces, stories, or how they would influence us within the next few short days, but we did know that God was in that place, and that He had brought gladness to us all together.
By the time we got to the town, it was almost dark, so we just set up our air mattresses and mosquito nets before eating dinner, meeting as a team, and hitting the hay to rest up for an early day of work the next day. We went to sleep to the sounds of the church members still singing praises in Creole as they all gathered around the porch of the Church walls, and sat on desks they had pulled out from school rooms. The joy in the air was penetrating.