As much as we may love Christmas, all the lights, music, and shopping that come with the season often seem disconnected from the real world, from our real lives. This winter, author and artist Scott Erickson’s work, Honest Advent, will help guide us as we seek “something honest, something real, something with some human grit and a little less green and red in it.”
Annunciation
Take a moment to consider how patiently you are waiting in this Advent season? How open are you to the annunciation—the revelation—of God-with-Us, even in unexpected places? What transformation is God doing in you right now?
LIGHT
Our invitation to Advent starts here, now—and thank God, because being here now feels really complicated. And hard. And sad at times. With a lot of loss. Right?
MOTHERHOOD
As you consider the gifts and challenges of your relationship to the mothers in your life, think about where you feel gratitude and where you feel pain. What connection do they have to these early days of Advent?
Vulnerability
It is difficult to think of the story of Jesus’ nativity without acknowledging the pain of the war that rages in the region in which he was born. As innocents suffer, we cry out to God and we look to those who have walked the way of peace-making before.
VULNERABILITY
Quick. Half full or half empty? It is interesting that those who spent time with Jesus consistently described Him as being ‘full of truth.’ How will you cultivate grace in this season? For others? For yourself?
ALPHA
What does it mean to participate in the birthing of God and in the expectant waiting of this season? How can you embody God in this moment?
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BREATH
And. One small word that connects so much. In this scripture alone, it bridges all that has been or ever will be, holding together the tension between who have power and privilege and those who never have. It is also a pause, a breath.
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OMEGA
Advent is a season associated with birth…but every birth ends with a death. Advent means coming in Latin, and the paradox of Advent is that while it is a coming appearance, it’s also an acknowledgement that there is a coming disappearance.
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MYSTERY
“How can this be,” Mary asked the angel. Together we pray to respond to the gift of God-with-US with the same wonder.
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ASSUMPTIONS
What about the nativity amidst the rubble? How does Jesus challenge our assumptions about God? Power? Human community?
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SEEN
When do you feel most loved? Whose approval do you most want? What kinds of things make you feel like love has to be earned? Consider the small kindnesses…
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SACRED
To make something sacred is to give reverence to the weight of its importance. The only problem in the process of making something sacred is that we usually cut out all the really human stuff that is equally part of these divine happenings.
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COUNSELOR
As you wander through your bafflingly painful and breathtakingly beautiful life, may you find the most honest words possible to speak of it all
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MIGHTY
God’s spirit does not come to those who are already mighty. Not Herod at the beginning of Jesus’ life. Not Annas or Caiaphus or Pilot at the end. The spirit of God is never aligned with the might of empire.
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FATHER
Take three minutes to listen to this acapella version of the ancient hymn, “Of the Father’s Love Begotten.” Why has this hymn endured for more than 1,000 years? What ancient wisdom does it reveal about the nature of God?
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PEACE
God of Justice, give strength to those whose long work for a just peace might seem fruitless now. Strengthen their resolve. Help all people choose the rigorous path of just peace and disavow violence.
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ROOM
As we draw closer to Christmas, some of us are all in on the twinkly glow of the season. But some of us are frantic or fearful or desperate or heartbroken and we don’t have room for one more party or pretense. Still, God-with-Us comes.
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GOOP
The Christ story is actually about a God who brings salvation into the world through all those messy details. Where do you embrace the mess of life? Where do you resist it? What is hopeful about a God who saves us, not from the mess, but in the midst of the mess?
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BREAKING
Maybe it’s our presence that needs to be broken open this Advent. Like people, or broken hearts, or systems, or perspectives, or beliefs, or our dashed hopes for a brighter tomorrow.
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UNEXPECTED
The Christmas story is full of unexpected moments where God is revealed in unexpected moments to unexpected people. Shepherds. Teenage girls. Wise ones from afar. Again and again, God-with-Us is revealed, not in solidarity with the powerful and mighty, but hidden among the the humble and marginalized.
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