On December 3rd, Sunday Fellowship gathered to welcome Advent and reflect on the question “How does a weary world rejoice? (a line from O Holy Night).” We sang, prayed and created glow-in-the-dark “moon prayers” to express our weariness and deepest longings to God. The gathering concluded with a festive hot chocolate bar. Please enjoy the photos.

We gathered around our fire pit again for hot dogs, s’mores, carols, and fellowship! Thanks to everyone who helped host and those who attended!

Why do we mistake these beautiful texts of Advent? A reflection on Isaiah 11:1-11 and Luke 1:46-55.

A huge “thank you” to all of our volunteers, caregivers and staff for making Sunday Fellowship in the Light possible this year in all its many forms! It is a testament to our partnership that we were able to offer a safe event that was truly accessible to everyone. Please enjoy these photos showing outdoor visits at home with baby Jesus and in-person visits to a music-filled, candlelit Sanctuary for the first time since March. We hope everyone is enjoying their gift bag filled with holiday cookies and Sunday Fellowship’s newly minted T-shirts. Merry Christmas to all!

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Over 40 children, parents, and grandparents joined us on Saturday, December 7th for our annual Children’s Ministries Advent in the Light event. Our theme this year was prophets – both ancient and modern – and how they help us wake up to hope and pay attention to God’s message during Advent. Prophets are carriers of the messages about how God longs for our world to be, and they share these messages loudly (check out this video of Greta Thunberg at the UN Climate Action Summit in September, furiously calling out world leaders for not doing more to tackle the climate crisis). We asked children and parents – what do you hope, pray, and imagine for our world this Advent? Can you think about what God wants for our world and imagine how you can be a part of that change? Before entering the labyrinth, people wrote their prayers on gold stars and then carried them into the center (these stars of hope are now hanging outside the sanctuary!). Children and adults also engaged in making play dough stars, creating 3D star ornaments for our Gift Tree in the sanctuary, painting kindness rocks, and decorating our Imagine poster. As always, the evening was filled with warmth, light and delight in coming together during this dark season to share hope and peace as a community. Enjoy the pictures from our evening together!

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The season of Advent, this season of preparation for Christmas, begins with Prophets. Prophets are people who have a special ability to understand God’s longing for our world.  Prophets are people who are willing to share God’s longing for our world with others: to share it loud, to share it strong, no matter what the consequences.  The Prophet Isaiah says:

God will make justice among the people, and they will beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. (Isaiah 2:4)

No one will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain; for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the LORD as the waters cover the sea. (Isaiah 11:9)

The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad, the desert shall rejoice and blossom; like the crocus it shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice with joy and singing. (Isaiah 35:1-2)

Isaiah was a prophet. He also spoke of another prophet who would come after him, someone who would be a voice crying out in the wilderness, saying, “Prepare the way of the Lord.” Some people think the prophet Isaiah described was a man we call John the Baptist. He preached and baptized out by the Jordan River, saying:

Turn around, change your ways, for God’s heavenly way has come near. (Matthew 3:2)

Many people feel that John’s work made way for the ministry of Jesus.

Another person who bears witness to God’s truth in this season, and who makes way for Jesus, is Mary of Nazareth.  Mary accepts a frightening invitation from an angel and agrees to bear a special child. She says:

O God, your mercy is for those who fear you from generation to generation. You show your strength and scatter the proud. You bring down the powerful from their thrones, and lift up the lowly. You fill the hungry with good things, and send the rich away empty. You help your people, remembering to be merciful, as you promised our ancestors. (Luke 1:50-55)

I wonder if you can think of people today who bravely share their ideas about how our world should be, how our world could be, how God longs for our world to be.

This season between Thanksgiving and Christmas, there are so many ways that we could use our time and energy. If we listen to our television, and our email inbox, and our postal mail, and our calendar, they may tell us to do things like:

• Make a list of all the things that we wish we had.
• Spend lots of time and money shopping for things we think other people might like to have.
• Stay up late and attend lots of parties
• Get really busy with planning and wrapping and travelling and cleaning and cooking
• Eat lots and lots of things, including lots of sugar
• Drink lots and lots of things, including lots of alcohol (for the adults).

Now I’m sure that many of us will do many of the things on that list. Most of them can be fun in moderation for most of us.  They can also provide some distraction from the fact that it’s cold outside, and dark at 4:30 p.m..

But the season of Advent, and the prophets in it, invite us to include something different in this season. They invite us to:

• Find a moment to get quiet: by ourselves, or with a few people we really care about.
• If it’s already dark, to light a candle.
• Breathe in and out, and become aware of the moment we are living in.
• Be honest about what is difficult or painful in our lives, and in the life of the world, not trying to cover it up.
• Wake up our sense of hope for healing, for change.
• Pay attention, to all those who are working for beautiful change around us.
• Begin to imagine how we could be a very small part of that great big beautiful change.

I hope you’ll get some resources from this church to help you do these things, this season; or that you’ll spend some time today considering how you might make this a season of holy preparation, of spiritual nourishment.

At the service, we went on to learn a new (to us) version of Mary’s Magnificat by Ray Makeever, complete with motions learned at Holden Village!

Angels have been hovering all around us this Advent season, and we continued this theme last Sunday in our multiage Sunday school class.  After lighting our third candle in our Advent wreath and a candlelit opening combining all three classes, the multiage children enjoyed finding angels illustrated in the book The Nativity by Julie Vivas and then watched a fantastic short video called An Unexpected Christmas, featuring God’s host of angels very surprised by God’s plan for Jesus’ birth.  Check out the video here.  We then explored three different activity stations: decorating angel coloring pages, creating sparkly angel messages, and reading Christmas books in an ever-expanding twinkling fort.  The reading fort started under one table with three children, then grew (with the help of some very motivated kid engineers) to encompass the entire stage to fit everyone.  Always room for one more!

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Offered by Joyce DeGreeff on December 16th, 2018

Genesis 18:1-16, Hebrews 13:1-2

When I was a child, I lived in Ogunquit, Maine, otherwise known as the “beautiful place by the sea”. Many of you might recognize this place as a popular vacation spot with a gorgeous sandy beach. You might have walked the famous Marginal Way path that winds around the rocky part of this coastal town to the harbor of Perkins Cove, or visited the many interesting shops and restaurants in the local village.  Well, my family owned one of those shops – it was called The Oxbow Gift Shop – and we lived in a tiny 900 square foot apartment above it.  When I say “we” I mean our family of 8 … 2 parents, 4 kids, and 2 dogs! 

As you can imagine, I have many memories and funny stories to retell from our life together above that gift shop.  But one in particular comes to mind in relationship to this morning’s readings. 

On a cold winter day, my parents decided to give an open invitation at church to anyone who might like to come over for a sledding party in our backyard.  With very short notice, 37 people thought this was a great idea!  Now most hosts, in this situation, would enjoy the party outside and perhaps make a big pot of hot cocoa that everyone should share before calling it a day.  Well, not my parents.  They decided it would be fun to extend the party and invite everyone inside for a spaghetti dinner.  37 plus our 6 – that’s 43 people in 900square feet…for dinner!  Everyone had a great time and no one went away hungry as far as I know, and to this day, people are still talking about my mom’s famous spaghetti sauce.  My dad’s favorite part of the story is when he finally got his plate of food, he looked around at the overcrowded apartment and couldn’t find a place to sit – on chairs or anywhere on the floor.  Then he had what he thought was a brilliant idea and headed for the bathroom.  But when he got there, to his surprise he found two people already in there eating- one on the bath tub and one on the toilet! So he resigned himself to the fact that he would just need to eat standing up. 

When both of my parents, and some of their longtime friends, talk about this day (trust me,we’ve heard the story many times!) there’s a sense of joy-filled playfulness and pride in pulling off such an unconventional, and even downright ludicrous,dinner party.  There were no cloth napkins or fancy china, no candle light or peaceful music playing the background – just pure chaos, great food, and even better company.  As a child I thought it was really crazy and super fun.  And now as an adult, looking back, what stands out the most to me is the open hearted hospitality, the generosity, and the pure joy of the occasion.

This dinner party is what first came to my mind when I read today’s story from Genesis 18where three men suddenly appear to Abraham outside of his humble house.  Immediately, Abraham offers them water to wash their feet and then goes into his tent to ask Sarah to prepare bread and his servant to prepare a meat offering. These travelers gladly receive the meal and eat it together, with Abraham standing by, under a tree outside of his dwelling place.  And then one of them, claiming to be ‘the Lord’,  mentions to Abraham that he will“return in due season” and that his wife Sarah will “bear a son”.  Sarah overhears this from the tent entrance and begins to laugh.  Given the circumstance of their ages, do you blame her? 

But the messenger questions her laughter and reiterates his promise:

The Lord said to Abraham, “Why did Sarahlaugh, and say, ‘Shall I indeed bear a child, now that I am old?’  Is anything too wonderful for the Lord? At the set time I will return to you, in due season,and Sarah shall have a son.” But Sarah denied, saying, “I did not laugh”; for she was afraid. And he said, “Oh yes, you did laugh.” (Genesis 18:13-15)

You gotta love Sarah – brave enough to bicker with the Lord!

It’s all here…hosptality, generosity, humor, and most importantly the very real presence of God. 

In both Jewish and Greco-Roman culture, hospitality was highly regarded and very important for those who wanted to be considered “virtuous”.  And travelers tended to lean on this “culture of hospitality”, relying on the kindness of normal folks when they found themselves in need in unfamiliar territory. So that they showed up isn’t all that unusual, but their identity and their message is a bit more intriguing.  Many have wondered

Who exactly were these three men?  Not all agree on the answer. 

The Jewish Talmud refers to the visitors as three angels, and although the Torah doesn’t mention the names, the Talmud identifies them as Raphael, Michael, and Gabriel.

Some Christians have interpreted the appearance of the three visitors as a vision of the Trinity – in that all three men, together, represent the one true God.

Neither of these explanations seems to fit the text exactly, though.  A more agreed upon Christian understanding is that one indeed was God (given the many references to “the Lord” in the passage) and the other two were angels – partly there for support and partly just passing through on their way to fulfill other missions described later in this chapter of Genesis. 

 In this case,  the visitation represents a “Theophany” or a manifestation of God in human form.  Some Christians would take it even a step further and call it a “Christophany” – suggesting a notion of a pre-incarnation of Jesus,  a foreshadowing of when God is made flesh through the eventual birth of the Christ child.

Regardless of how one chooses to understand the exact identity of these visitors, it’s clear to me that Abraham and Sarah experienced a “holy moment” – a life-changing and life-giving encounter with the Spirit of God.  It doesn’t seem to me that the author of this story is so concerned with proving the existence of heavenly messengers or supernatural beings;  rather, what I think is significant is to witness what happens when we offer hospitality and open ourselves up to entertain unexpected guests. Through human connection, generosity, and vulnerability … God shows up!  When we show up for each other, the Spirit of Love and Grace that is God, is there too – helping us to find the right words,to show compassion. and even to have a little fun!

As our brief reading from Hebrews this morning reminds us:  “Let mutual love continue.  Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for doing so, some have entertained angles unawares.” 

These words, commonly assigned to Paul, are likely a direct reference to the Abraham story which, for first-century Jewish writers, would have been considered the premier model of hospitality.  I can’t help but to notice the implications of this ancient text for our world today. What if we were to receive and welcome those in need with the same sort of hospitality that Abraham and Sarah, and countless other Biblical characters,offered to fellow travelers?   Refugees, immigrants, prisoners and other displaced people come to mind  … veterans, people mourning the loss of loved ones, struggling kids and their parents, people who need food, shelter, or maybe just a listening ear and some company?  My guess is that we’d often been tertaining angels – and in doing so, experiencing the very real gift of God’spower and love.

I can think of many examples here at WCUC, of the ways in which this kind of hospitality already happens.  I remember when Sarah Hindle opened up her home for a day long women’s retreat, and when others in this congregation have hosted Dine with Nine dinner parties and end-of-year celebrations for the staff or the choirs. This year there was even a  house party to brainstorm ideas for Congregational Giving! 

“Hospitality”, though, isn’t just about opening up our homes…more to the point, it’s really about opening up our hearts and inviting the Spirit to be with us.  God shows up in places like this sanctuar yand the downstairs classrooms when we welcome all people with no exceptions.   Jesus’ way of healing and inspiration shows up to journey with us when we gather at Walden Pond for weekly walking prayer.  And the Spirit often shows up in one on one conversations too, like the ones we had last year as part of our “In Reach” program.  Many of us experienced the true joy that can come from simply meeting up with someone we don’t know very well and sharing our stories.  In these moments of vulnerable storytelling,God empowers both the teller and the listener to gratefully receive the gift of Love found through genuine human connection.

 When youth group parents gather at my humble dorm apartment (Ok, “humble” is a relative term here…we do have more room than the 900 square feet of my childhood, but we also share our building with 31 teenage boys!)… In any case,when we fill our living room for important conversations about the joys and challenges of raising adolescents, God’s Spirit is there.

And when those adolescents arrive for game night with a distinct mix of awkward silence, playful laughter, nervous energy, and authentic presence… there, too, is God. 

 When we show up for each other, God shows up for us, time and time again. This grace-filled Spirit helps us to step out of our comfort zones, to take risks, and to open our hearts to unexpected possibilities and sometimes even life-changing transformation.

“The angels proclaim You will arrive among us, a joy to meet our longing:  Come, O Come, Emmanuel -God with Us”

Amen.

We had a fantastic evening with children and families last Saturday, December 8th.  Take a look!