Journal

Series: Advent

The Roots of Our Gratitude

The Roots of Our Gratitude

For the Lord your God is living among you. He is a mighty savior. He will take delight in you with gladness. With his love, he will calm all your fears. He will rejoice over you with joyful songs.—Zephaniah 3:17“We must understand that God does not ‘love’ us without...
The Gift of Mourning

The Gift of Mourning

by Bill Simmons, President & CEO of American Leprosy Missions What is that nagging feeling I have?  Why do I feel a heaviness in my heart?  Something is clawing at my mind, clouding my eyes, preventing me from seeing the road ahead.  As this year draws to a close,...
4 Films for Advent

4 Films for Advent

The Advent Season presents us with the invitation to slow down, to shear away the clutter and noise of our lives enough to dwell on some of the richest themes in human existence.  We can observe how these themes play out in the grand drama of Scripture, as well as in...
Waiting Well: 2020 Advent Offerings

Waiting Well: 2020 Advent Offerings

The challenge is to wait well.  Over the past nine months, we have grown familiar with (and probably quite tired of) longing, hoping, and anticipating a promised restoration of life, peace, and community that remains on the unreachable horizon.  As we relinquish...
Deliverer, Delivered

Deliverer, Delivered

“While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son.”  Luke 2:6 (NIV)   In an unknown town, a week’s distance from the womanly wisdom of mother, sisters, aunts, it began.  Plodding heavily beside...
Joseph Speaks

Joseph Speaks

She insisted on seeing me face-to-face, unveiled, defying all custom for the betrothed to remain apart until the wedding feast. I watched her eyes rain when she saw doubt and pain in mine. They said it was a good match: me from David’s royal line, she connected to...

Advent Resources

Here’s a list of Advent resources, curated with love, that we hope will help you prepare well for Christmas this year. An innovative and beautiful online Advent Calendar utilizing Visio Divina, Biola University’s Advent Project, leads you through visual...

SOUNDINGS – Deep Longing, Deeper Hope

Advent–always a wonderful, and strange, season.   It’s wonderful because it gives the opportunity once again to recall the long wait of the people of God for their Savior, and the promises punctuating centuries of waiting throughout the Old Testament that would find...

Advent and the Upside Down Kingdom

“In that day the wolf and the lamb will live together; the leopard will lie down with the baby goat. The calf and the yearling will be safe with the lion, and a little child will lead them all.” Isaiah 11:6 By: Margot Eyring, Spiritual Director with Coracle When Jesus...
Advent : The Beauty of Holy Anticipation

Advent : The Beauty of Holy Anticipation

As I look out my window at the multi-colored display of foliage, I find myself thanking God again for the gift of seasons, each with its own distinctive mood and beauty. Each leaf is a declaration of the mind and heart of God who envisioned creating a world full of...

Advent in a Divided Season

By: Todd Deatherage As 2016 moves to its end, many wish it had all been just an unpleasant dream. Our experiences this year, as in most, teach us that things are not right in the world, not as they should be. An ugly American election season has exposed deep fault...

Waiting for Jesus – First week of Advent

Every year as Advent begins our family takes out its Christmas library – the loosely curated stash of books acquired over many years conveying the Christmas story and spirit in poetry, images, songs, and stories from across centuries and around the world.  At the...

Orienting Towards Advent

Soon, well already actually, you’re going to get slammed with the commercialization that surrounds the Advent and Christmas season.   Very little in the holiday season is going to be calling you to engage the deep meaning of it, the Person, the Baby, the One Who Came,...

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