Advent Day 8

Here we are in a different Advent, younger, with three young children, and somehow more time...

Well the road to church was quite eventful.  As you may have gathered from yesterday's installment, things didn't go as planned.  We were hoping to catch up on our Christmas stuff.  We haven't decorated much at all.  Christmas shopping has been put on hold.  So Saturday--the last day in the first week of Advent--was going to be the day.  Instead we rushed about to get ready and...well...we ended up in the emergency room. 

Don't worry about that part.  Honestly everyone will be fine in a couple days.  Still, it made for a late night getting ready to worship today, which was followed by a long day of errands just getting ready for the week ahead.  At least we discussed where we would like to have a Christmas tree.

Today we lit the peace candle on the Advent wreath, which reminded me of last week's prayer.  I have been thinking about peace a great deal lately.  There seems to be so little of it.  There is so much going on in the world and there is a great deal going on in our hearts as well.  Last week's pastoral prayer addressed many of the same issues even though it was supposed to be about hope.  Here is the "prayer" from today though I guess it is more of a poem when I look at it...

Advent Peace
​Adam Tierney-Eliot

It feels strange 
to pray for peace in
a time of growing war.
Our souls yearn for
Something better, more
holy, more powerful
than the drama of
human conflict 
and yet…here we are;
In a world filled
with prayers that
we do not heed.

But we persist in our dream. 
The dream is better than reality
and somewhere in our hearts
we still believe
that it is possible, possible
to build that
commonwealth of heaven
where justice will roll down
and wars will cease

So we light candles, we sing songs 
About life subsisting in hard places.
We bring the green of life into
the dark of winter.
We tell stories of peace and justice and
we even act on those stories.
So may we keep on dreaming
though the world may
try to stop us
and force us into despair.

Hope exists as it always has
in acts of love when love
is not expected
an attitude of faith
when despair is desired
And always hope for the next day
And the next step
That will bring us closer to grace 
​