This week’s lessons
First Lesson: Isaiah 64:1-9
Second Lesson: 1 Corinthians 1-9
The Gospel: Mark 13:24-37
A message from Rev. David Prentice
Where I usually begin with thoughts and ideas for prayer, I wanted to say a few things about Advent. Four candles are usually placed in a ring for this time of prayer and contemplation, and I encourage you to do the same. This can be any four candles, even if they are not the “correct” colors tradition offers. As is true of all traditions, the content of your heart matters more than getting it in someone else’s perception of what is right. These candles will be the focus of your prayers for the next few weeks – lighting one each Sunday as the arrival of the Messiah draws closer.
Let us pray.
The Lord is our faith and our life.
May the Lord’s peace be with us all.
And His love shine in our heats
Our hope is in the coming of the Lord
Light the first candle.
Let us pray.
God in Heaven, our hearts desire the warmth of your love and our minds are searching for the light of your word. Increase our longing for Christ our Savior and give us strength to grow in our faith so that the day of his coming may find us prepared and filled with joy. Amen.
Dorothy Day, described as “perhaps the best-known political radical in the American Catholic Church,” once said, “Advent is a time of waiting, of expectation, of silence. Waiting for our Lord to be born. A pregnant woman is so happy, so content. She lives in such a garment of silence, and it is as though she were listening to hear the stir of life within her. One always hears that stirring compared to the rustling of a bird in the hand. But the intenseness with which one awaits such stirring is like nothing so much as a blanket of silence.”
Let us wait, quietly, together.
Yours in Christ.
Dave+