Thoughts About What We’re Reading…

 

This week I will pause from our normal blogging pattern to share with you what we are doing at Central in the coming weeks heading into Advent. Next week we will have a special “Thanksgiving” blog set apart from our reading.

Please continue to read through the plan, which should take you as far as Ezekiel 39 ending on Friday, November 28.

On that date, we will take a break from our normal reading and normal blog pattern until January.

Starting in December and all the way through the Advent Season, we will switch our reading plan and blogs to follow through the Advent series at the church that we are calling, “The Ultimate Christmas Story.”

Andrew Alesso will be our guest blogger through the Advent season, I will pick it back up when we resume our Old Testament reading plan in January. When we conclude that plan at the end of January, we will begin a new plan that takes us through the New Testament! Yea!

So what is Advent?

The word Advent means “coming” or “arrival.”

Advent is a season celebrated in the church, typically identified as the last four weekends leading up to Christmas Day, concluding on Christmas Eve.

When we celebrate Advent, we celebrate the revelation of God in Christ whereby all of creation might be reconciled to Him.

The focus of the entire season is the celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ in His First Advent, and the anticipation of the return of Christ the King in His Second Advent.

Advent also symbolizes our spiritual journey as we affirm that Christ has come, that He is present in the world today, and that He will come again in power.

It is a time when we celebrate and acknowledge that we live “between the times” of His First and Second Coming and are called to be faithful stewards of what is entrusted to us as God’s people.

That is why we celebrate Advent.

We will follow the traditionally recognized themes of Hope, Peace, Joy and Love each week as we work our way through the series.

We have been working hard to prepare for Advent and I HOPE (I am first up in the Advent Series with a sermon on HOPE on Thanksgiving weekend) you will be blessed and invite others to come all four weekends leading up to Christmas Eve Services.

If you want to be in the know… wear something purple to services Thanksgiving weekend.

He is coming!  King Jesus is coming!

Until next time…keep reading!

God bless you all!

Jim