Advent.....? Advent!

It's December - can you believe it? The older I get the quicker time seems to move. With December comes Advent. What is Advent you ask? Good question. Growing up in the Church of Christ I heard quite a bit about Christmas, but I don't think I actually heard about Advent until I was in college. Advent is a Christian season that lasts for about four weeks. It begins four Sundays before Christmas and ends on Christmas Eve.

The Christian season of Christmas actually begins on Christmas Eve and lasts for twelve days, ending on January 6. The time before Christmas is Advent, a season of preparation for Christmas. Christians prepare for celebrating the birth of Jesus by remembering the longing of the Jews for a Messiah. In Advent we’re reminded of how much we also need a Savior, and we look forward to our Savior’s second coming even as we prepare to celebrate his first coming at Christmas. Indeed, the word Advent comes from the Latin word that means “coming” or “visit.” In the season with this name, we keep in mind both “advents” of Christ, the first in Bethlehem and the second yet to come. The idea of slowing down and reflecting is so difficult to do in December, when the quickness of life (and preparing for the secular aspects of Christmas) can overwhelm.

But the season of Advent can be a beautiful time to reflect and prepare our hearts (which is something we should be doing every day). For more on Advent check out the website of Mark Roberts: http://markdroberts.com/?p=636 and to help remind ourselves of Advent, Charlie Lowell, keyboardist for Jars of Clay, is keeping an Advent blog and each day is posting a poem. Check out his blog here: http://adventpoetry.blogspot.com/