What's Andrew got to do with it?

Today is St Andrews’s day, a day on which the Scots, Russians and Greeks who have him as their patron saint do ….? Well what do we do? To be honest I’m not sure what most Scot’s do, we seem to have kept the day and lost all the traditions.

I must admit that I’ve struggled a bit with this falling within advent. I mean whose idea was it to let St. Andrews day fall within advent, should our focus not be 100% on Jesus? Is this not a distraction from the “main thing?”

I thought about this as I walked home last night and concluded that it is actually quite appropriate for us to think about St Andrews day during advent.

My sense of knowing that as a Scot I’m supposed to do something today but I know not what is perhaps like many who know there’s something special about advent and that there’s more to it than candles and coat hangers (this only makes sense if you grew up watching Blue Peter). But they don’t know what to do. We (i.e. society at large) have this period of advent and Christmas day but we’ve lost the context. So here’s the challenge….do I spend advent reflecting upon Emanuel in a privatistic or narcissistic way? Or is part of my reflection upon the birth of Jesus the imperative to help others to find Him, to this advent discover what it’s all about. This leads me to my second thought.

God is Emmanuel

Advent a time of preparation, preparation of the heart and mind, Like Lent it’s also a penitential time to reflect and seek forgiveness in readiness to receive Christ a fresh in our lives!

God is Emanuel which means God is with us, he’s right in the depths of over lives, of our very beings, experiencing everything we go through, and saying its ok I’m here!

But isn’t it sometimes (maybe all the time) hard to see Christ at work in the lives of:

The Homeless
Drug Addict
Person with Mental Illness
Person with a Terminal Illness
Those who have just given up
Those in Prison

God comes to all of us and says I am here, rest on me I will give you strength for today and forever. Our challenge today is to seek God in each other to encourage each other on our Advent journey to our Bethlehem!

questions to ponder

As advent begins ...

some questions to ponder ...

Who are we looking forward to?
Who are we hoping for?
Who are we anticipating?
Who are we dreaming of?
Who are we in love with?
Who are we thinking about inside?
Who are we eager to avoid?
Who are we trusting in?
Who are we uneasy around?
Who are we giving our time to?
Who are we shopping for?
Who are we ambitious to become?
Who are we forgetting?
Who are we guilty of lying to?
Who are we impatient with?
Who are we loved by?


May God bless you
may God shine his face upon you
and give you peace

advent blog 05

advent blog starts next week ... (updated again 29 nov)

Our advent blog will start next week. Thanks to all of you who have agreed to blog with us over the next few weeks, you should receive an invitation via blogger soon ...

Feel free to blog anything as long as there is some kind of link to advent.

Try not to make your posts too long ...

Looking forward to see what happens ...

Please indicate a day or days (in comments) when you would like to, or be happy to, blog / don't worry if someone's taken your day, we can 2 blogs a day ...

28 nov - andy goodliff
29 nov - anderson marsh
30 nov - brodie mcgregor
1 dec - yasmin finch
2 dec - laurence craig
3 dec - ashley beck
4 dec - day of advent blogging rest
5 dec - jason fout
6 dec - brodie mcgregor
7 dec - maggi dawn
8 dec - steve goodliff
9 dec - flick
10 dec - anderson marsh
11 dec - day of advent blogging rest
12 dec - lorcan
13 dec - maggi dawn
14 dec - yasmin finch
15 dec - jason fout
16 dec - laurence craig
17 dec - flick
18 dec - day of advent blogging rest
19 dec - ashley beck
20 dec - maggi dawn
21 dec - brodie mcgregor
22 dec - steve goodliff
23 dec - Steve Jones
24 dec - andy goodliff

advent blog coming soon ...

at the end of november advent - the beginning of the christian year begins, taking us to christmas.

ash beck and myself are hoping to get a group of people together to blog us through, reflecting on its meaning and helping us open our imaginations ...

so keep a look out ...