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Thoughts for the Week: 3rd Sunday of Advent – Celebrate Jesus

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I have always been interested in the simplicity of Celtic worship and have at times used it on a Sunday morning. Today we will have a mixture of worship and you may have seen the poster that Lisa prepared which simply says: CELEBRATE JESUS LIGHT OF THE WORLD
If you have a window or a Notice Board nearby, please request a poster to display it. Because of the vaccine we are, perhaps, saying to ourselves that the light of Jesus is now shining brighter than it has been for months due to COVID-19. Whatever went through our minds during that time there was never a belief that we wouldn’t see that light again. Remember what we read from John’s Gospel chapter 1 v5 we can look back in wonder if we remind ourselves what lighting the ADVENT CANDLES really means: “The light shines in the darkness but the darkness has never overcome it.”
Firstly, we say in prayer, God of all hope shine your light on the story of the Saints who journeyed before us. May the seed that they planted in the world, seeds of peace, joy and love take hold in our hearts and stretch towards the light. We look now at Psalm 5. In the beginning, David is remembering his own sins and those of others but as he cries to God there is a different feeling in his mind. Verse 11 says, “Let all who take refuge in you ever sing for joy” and we think about one of the Advent hopes: “We light a candle for peace and pray for the courage to stand up for it. As the waiting and expectation deepen our desire for peace, like the wise called to journey in those early dawning days, may we seek, strive and search for peace.”
Each of the Saints of old have their own journey story. Today we have a very shortened story of St. Brendan. Born in AD 489 in Tralee, SW Ireland, he was brought up on the stories of Noah, Moses and Jonah. He travelled with the Lord instead of searching for Him. To him, Jesus was a pioneer, the way, the truth and the life. Throughout his life he was looking for the Island of Promise and even though he didn’t find it, he died aged 90 and then put his foot on the true Island of Promise. This is like the story of an old climber who set off to climb a mountain in freezing cold. When questioned about getting there he said, “My heart is there already so others can follow”.

PRAYERS

Where we are at the present time is part of our spiritual journey or you might call it your voyage. Recently we have all been tested on our lives and how we have coped with the changes made for us. When we look at Lisa’s poster, do we see the light shining for us and leading us on in our new lives? Do we celebrate Jesus who also had a difficult life and a terrible death in giving Himself for us, and are our hearts already where our Lord Jesus Christ is, watching over us all the times of our lives?
I know that you are all wondering about the futures of our Chapels so join me in prayer each day:
Heavenly Father, we praise and worship you, and we try to be positive about the future. We pray that we will be able to open the Chapels for services again. We pray for Long Itchington and the repairs that are needed. And we pray for both congregations to be able to sing with joy and praise to You Lord, as it says in the Psalm, and as in Psalm 66 to shout with joy and sing the glory of God’s name. The Psalm speaks to us saying, “Say to God, ‘How awesome are your deeds, so great is your power. All the earth bows down to you; they sing praise to you.”
We pray in the name of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. We move in prayer to the Holy Spirit who is our comforter, our counsellor, our help in times of need. We pray for all the children who have been brought before you in the chapels. Some will be in other churches, some in other lands, some who have faith in you and others who have none. Father, Son and Holy Spirit hear our prayers and guide us and all who might be open to a call to serve you in either of our chapels. Amen

Thoughts for the Week: 2nd Sunday of Advent

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Last week on Advent Sunday, Matthew’s Gospel led me to think with the disciples about the future. As the disciples left the Temple with Jesus, they looked up at the buildings and commented on the magnificence of the Temple that had been rebuilt by Herod the Great to keep the Jewish people satisfied. This included the religious Pharisees to whom the building was more important than Himself. He told the disciples that at a certain time it would all be destroyed. After this Jesus told them what they would see happen in the future, for instance wars earthquakes etc. They asked when the end would come, and Jesus replied that only the Father knew but the Gospel must be preached in all nations. (Matthew 24)
There are many ways of spreading the Gospel: Long Compton’s living Advent Tree, lights & candles and Christmas cards with the Nativity or parts of the story such as the shepherds or the Magi which are not always available. LISA has prepared posters that you might like to put in your window or on a notice board AND I have made an exhibition of ten Nativities which I would have put in Long Itchington Chapel but it wasn’t to be again. So, back to ADVENT Sunday No. 2.
WE LIGHT THE SECOND CANDLE TO CELEBRATE HOW GOD, THROUGH THE BIRTH OF HIS SON JESUS, BROUGHT LIGHT OUT OF DARKNESS SO THAT WE CAN TRUST HIM TO BE WITH US AT ALL TIMES. IN THE WORDS OF ISAIAH, “THOUGH DARKNESS WILL ENVELOP THE EARTH, SEEMINGLY IMPENETRABLE, HIS LIGHT WILL SHINE UPON YOU, HIS PRESENCE GLOWING BRIGHTLY IN YOUR MIDST.” (Isaiah 60 v2)
Many years ago, my son Darren and his wife Kirstie went on a safari in Kenya and bought me a present, which was the Nativity. It was made out of an old Coca Cola can. The shape is of the place where Jesus was born because there was no room for them in the inn and if you look closely you might make out shapes of people and animals. I have treasured the gift and what it meant for a long time.

PRAYERS

Ever loving Father, the words you gave to Isaiah were that the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Every year as we await the coming again of our Lord Jesus, we hope for the end of walking in darkness.
Every year we celebrate the coming of the Messiah, your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. Father God, you do not accept evil and we pray to be delivered from evil. We pray to come out of the darkness and yet it is still in the world.
Today, again, we cry for help. Jesus came bringing light into a darkened world. Today, we are waiting to celebrate the gift of our Lord.
Father, we ask forgiveness that we have spoken about repentance but have failed again and again to follow in the way that your wonderful Son showed us. All around us we see injustice, a lack of love for one another, while we are fed with plenty, we know that others do not receive the daily bread because we have taken what is not ours to have. Lord Jesus Christ we pray for change in ourselves as we repent in Your Name. Amen

Thoughts for the Week: 1st Sunday of Advent

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By the time you receive these THOUGHTS we will have started Advent. In my thoughts last week, I suggested we might light a large candle in our homes as we will not be able to have our Advent ring in the Chapel. I thought afterwards that many Christmas lights would be safer. I noticed that one of my neighbours had put beautiful lights on the outside of her house and thought it can never be too early to welcome Jesus into our lives again. When we light a candle, we read the following:

WE LIGHT THE FIRST CANDLE RECALLING THE EXPECTATION OF GOD’S PEOPLE OF THE PAST AND WE LOOK INTO THE FUTURE TO ALL THAT HE WILL ONE DAY DO. IN THE WORD’S OF ISAIAH, ‘WAKE UP AND SHINE, FOR THE LIGHT HAS DAWNED; THE GLORY OF THE LORD HAS RISEN AMONG YOU! YOUR LIGHT WILL ATTRACT NATIONS AND KINGS WILL COME TO SEE THE NEW DAY BREAKING AMONG YOU.’ (ISAIAH 60 v1-3)
LONG ITCHINGTON: It has been disappointing that we have to be in the third tier after keeping to the lockdown rules but the good news is that Rav has a builder friend who will repair the chapel’s ceiling at a very reasonable cost. The other good news is that we managed to fill 76 shoe boxes for Operation Christmas Child. The Church Support Worker congratulated us saying that it must have been difficult bringing together 76 shoe boxes during lockdown. But the Lord is good and now 76 children will be blessed. Well done!
LONG COMPTON: What a great idea to build an advent card using people. Lisa and I are pleased to take part by sending a Christmas object for your tree with our personal reason why Christmas is special to us. We hope to be able to see it and share some of how it went with Long Itchington after Christmas.

ADVENT HYMN

(can be sung to the tune O Word of God – no.527 in Mission Praise) 
Advent, a time of waiting
For Christ to reappear.
A time of preparation
With hope and fervent prayer
Each year we’re contemplating
The unknown hour or day,
When ev’ry knee will bow down
Before the Lord and pray.

The world is in a turmoil
As Jesus prophesied,
Nations fight each other
And faith in Christ’s denied.
He said, ‘stand against falseness
And do not be afraid,
For those who do not waver
He’s promised will be saved.

We join the heavenly angels
To praise God as they wait.
The father holds the secret
Of year and time and date.
Our lamps are full and ready,
Our hearts with joy expand
With love for the most needy
It was the Lord’s command.

And when He comes in glory,
When Advent is no more,
And all his angels with Him
From heaven’s open door;
For all who’ved followed closely
His life, his truth, His way,
He’ll say, ‘Come to the Kingdom,
You’ll be with me for aye.

PRAYER

A prayer for difficult times by Susan Durbur, URC Prayer Handbook

God of all love and understanding
you know that there will be many times this day
when I will, without much thought
ask to be spared something difficult.
You know the things I fear and dread
all that I recoil from or avoid.
But in this prayer now,
I ask for strength and courage
to bear the small trials of life
with cheerfulness and grace.
And, now before you,
I ask for all I might need
to face whatever life may bring me this day.
And, if one day I am tried beyond endurance,
I ask that I may know then
that you are with me.
May the Christ,
who in Gethsemane asked to be spared,
bless me with holy courage
that I may follow Him even to a cross.

Thoughts for the Week: Advent

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ADVENT for me is the beginning of an adventure leading to the birth of Jesus. Just as it was a change of life for many of the people who found themselves part of the coming of the Messiah into the world, it has also been the change throughout the years of people like us hearing about the Son of God and experiencing the love of God that Jesus brought into the world.
When we read Luke 1 v5-15 we become part of that adventure. We become part of the praying and the yearning of two good people, Zechariah the Priest and his wife Elizabeth, who had prayed and prayed for a special gift most of their lives. 
Years of longing, hoping, waiting
Vacuousness aching to be filled
Destructive hopelessness, envy
Rising dangerously, heart stilled
By force of will.
That’s just part of a poem and I pause deliberately at the word ‘will’ because it seemed that the couple had continued to serve God by accepting His will that there would be no child in their elderly age; and yet we know that God had listened to their prayers and it was His will to eventually fill the years that had been saddened with what they possibly saw as emptiness, to joy and delight and even more with a special kind of service. As the account from Luke’s Gospel tells us, what that service was to be we have lessons to learn. Zechariah, in spite of his praying and praying, fell short of his weak faith by his unbelief of the message brought to him by the Angel Gabriel from God. It’s interesting to read how God dealt with his show of fear and unbelief. We’ve all probably heard the saying, ‘Be careful what you pray for’.
I recently read a prayer which said this, “God, we wish that you would break through the darkness and evil of this world, that you would show yourself.”
It then went on to list those things that the writer thought bad and suggested how God should deal with them.
Taking us all back to ADVENT once more, the wonder of the story of Advent and the birth of Jesus the Messiah, we know that God has broken through by sending His Son into the world to bring us out of the darkness, to come as the light of the world. Not only did he show himself through His Son, He told us what we must do to be part of the light. Jesus the Son showed the great love that His Father had for the world by sacrificing Him. Christ has brought us out of darkness to live in his marvellous light.
We cannot gather to celebrate inside our Chapels at present, but we can have more lights this year in our homes with Nativities on show or some pictures of the Nativity.
LIGHT A LARGE CANDLE where it is safe and take time to think about Christingle and the people around the world who are thinking about the coming of Jesus.
HE IS OUR LIGHT. JESUS IS OUR WAY AND WITH JESUS EVEN IN THE DARKEST PLACES HE IS WITH US. IN JESUS WE WILL LIVE FOR EVER.
God of love, Father of all, the darkness that covered the earth has given way to the bright dawn of your Word made flesh. Make us a people of this light. Make us faithful to you that we may bring your light to the waiting world. Grant this through Christ our Lord. AMEN.