advent @ home

Advent knows something we often forget.

Advent knows that Christmas isn’t just this time of celebrating Jesus’ birth. Advent knows Christmas is something bigger and deeper than that – it's about beholding, experiencing, and celebrating a foundational truth about how we understand God, ourselves, and the world around us:

That in some mysterious way, God, through Jesus, is here, with us and for us, showing us what God is like, showing us what it means to be human, and leading us into a new kind of life and world.

And so knowing Christmas is about that, Advent invites us into this season of getting ready, of preparing to, once again, show up at the manger, and believing something new and good and beautiful is happening, join in on what God is doing, leaving behind what is and stepping into something new.

That’s what we’re getting ready for. That’s why we do Advent. We do Advent because the truth is: You can't get ready for something by being in it.

You can't get ready for a marathon by running it. You can't get ready for an argument by having it. That all takes some preparation. That all takes some getting ready.

What Advent knows is if you’re going to really do something well, you need to prepare.

Advent @ Home is meant to help you do exactly that. Use these daily devotionals to help you arrive at Christmas ready to welcome God's love and light into your life and world.

Unless otherwise indicated, the devotionals were written by Rev. Nick Coates

Banner artwork by Larry Stilwell

november 29, 2020

There’s something about the change in seasons. Each season not only offers some wisdom – like how winter reminds us that rest and dormancy are natural rhythms baked into the Universe, or summer reminds us how good it is to be out in nature – they also remind us of a really sacred truth: grace is baked into the Universe. Baked into the Universe is the natural rhythm of fresh starts, of beginning again … and again … and again.

As we head into the winter season and the beginning of Advent, we’re reminded we’re able to begin again, too. That’s what grace does. It’s the chance to start over, reset and realign, and keep moving forward. Sit with that for a moment. Baked into the Universe, this perpetual second chance to begin again. No matter who you are, what your story is, how many times you’ve fallen or failed, or what you’ve done, there is grace for you – just like this season – to start all over again. As we head, once again, into this new season of Advent, what will you do with the grace that’s all around you?

november 30, 2020

Advent means something like “the coming.” It’s a season that looks ahead to the birth of Jesus. That makes Advent a season of waiting. But here’s the thing about this waiting: it’s not passive. It’s not a sit-down-and-count-down-the-days kind of waiting. It’s an active kind of waiting. It’s a something-big-is-about-to-go-down-and-I-need-to-get-ready! kind of waiting. If you’ve had kids, you know this is the waiting that comes with pregnancy. If you’ve awaited a visitor, you know what it’s like to expect their arrival. If you’ve waited to go to a concert, you know the anticipation of listening to all their music so you can sing along.

This kind of waiting is important because it leads to being prepared. It leads to being ready. Advent is about actively waiting for Christmas by preparing for the arrival of the one we say is God-Amongst-Us – the one who will lead us into a new life and new world. As we await Christmas, how can you actively wait? What kind of preparation do you need to do to welcome God in? What can you do to be ready on Christmas morning?

december 1, 2020

“You would almost have to be nuts to be filled with hope in a world so rife with hunger, hatred, climate change, pollution, and pestilence, let alone the self-destructive or severely annoying behaviour of certain people, both famous and just down the hall, none of whom we will name by name. Yet I have boundless hope, most of the time. Hope is a sometimes cranky optimism, trust, and confidence that those I love will be okay – that they will come through, whatever life holds in store. Hope is the belief that no matter how dire things look or how long rescue or healing takes, modern science in tandem with people’s goodness and caring will boggle our minds, in the best way. Hope is (for me) not usually the religious-looking fingers of light slanting through the clouds, or the lurid sunrise. It’s more a sturdy garment, like an old chamois shirt: a reminder that I’ve been here before, in circumstances just as frightening, and I came through, and will again. All I have to do is stay grounded in the truth.”

- Anne Lamott

december 2, 2020

Hope is a funny thing. Not ha-ha funny, but funny in the way you laugh out loud when you find yourself doing something audacious and ridiculous, like staring into death, darkness and despair.

Here’s the thing about that laugh: it's one of the holiest sounds. It’s holy because not only does it come out of the truth we celebrate at Christmas – that this is God’s world and God is with us – but it also shows us that hope is not passive wishful thinking, but a loud and active refusal to believe that death, darkness, and despair have the final word.

That’s the thing about this funny hope Advent invites us to practice. It requires us to be in on the joke of Christmas by staring down the devastation around us and laughing in its face.

december 3, 2020

Advent is about getting caught up in the practice and rhythm of audacious hope. It’s a hope that calls us to boldly behold the darkness we experience because we’ve learned something about this God of ours, something beautifully counterintuitive and paradoxical, something Jesus opens up to us: that it’s in and through the darkness of our lives and world, it’s in and through the cold and pain of our lives and world, it’s in and through the brokenness of our lives and world, it’s there that God will appear.

That no matter how dark, cold, or broken it gets, God will come. It’s a hope that is shaped by the truths of Christmas: there isn't darkness too dark for God, and that this is God’s world and God is not finished with it yet.

december 4, 2020

“The house lights go off and the footlights come on. Even the chattiest stop chattering as they wait in darkness for the curtain to rise. In the orchestra pit, the violin bows are poised. The conductor has raised his baton. In the silence of a midwinter dusk, there is far off in the deeps of it somewhere a sound so faint that for all you can tell it may be only the sound of the silence itself. You hold your breath to listen. You walk up the steps to the front door. The empty windows at either side of it tell you nothing, or almost nothing. For a second you catch a whiff of some fragrance that reminds you of a place you’ve never been and a time you have no words for. You are aware of the beating of your heart. The extraordinary thing that is about to happen is matched only by the extraordinary moment just before it happens. Advent is the name of that moment.”

- Frederick Buechner

december 5, 2020

It’s interesting that, during a time of year that’s so dark and cold, we tell a story that’s so full of light and warmth. But that’s what stories do, isn’t it? They remind us of bigger truths than the ones we may be experiencing. They give us something to hold on to. It makes me think of this scene in Lord of the Rings when Frodo is about to call it quits:

FRODO: I can’t do this, Sam.

SAM: I know. It’s all wrong. By rights we shouldn’t even be here. But we are. It’s like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were. And sometimes you didn’t want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end, it’s only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you. That meant something. Even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back only they didn’t. Because they were holding on to something.

FRODO: What are we holding on to, Sam?

SAM: That there’s some good in this world, Mr. Frodo. And it’s worth fighting for.

december 6, 2020

Hardship may dishearten at first,

but every hardship passes away.

All despair is followed by hope;

all darkness is followed by sunshine.

- Rumi

december 7, 2020

The second week of Advent invites us to think about peace. But not just any peace – it's the kind of peace the writers of the Bible call shalom. Shalom is the peace of God, which is really just a way to talk about that peace we hear in those Bible stories like when God quiets the chaos, making room for creation, or when Jesus calmed the storm, letting the disciples in that boat know they’d be okay. It's a way to talk about those quiet and fleeting moments that centre, reassure, and let us catch our breath, and those moments when, even in the grips of fear and worry, we realize we’re not alone and have hope.

But even all of that doesn’t do it justice. It’s almost something we have to feel instead of describe: it’s that feeling of being safe amongst others. It’s that feeling of not carrying any grudges or bitterness. It’s that feeling of loving who you are. It’s that feeling of being at home in your body and in the world. It’s that feeling of knowing there is more than enough grace for you. That’s shalom. That’s the peace we’re talking about. If you know those feelings, you know that peace. And if you know it, if you’ve felt it before, if it’s gone to work within and around you, you know why it’s worth looking forward to. It’s a peace that can change everything.

december 8, 2020

“Jesus slipped into our world through the backroads and outlying districts of one of the least important places on earth and has allowed his program for human history to unfold ever so slowly through the centuries. He lived for thirty years among socially-insignificant members of a negligible nation – though one with a rich tradition of divine covenant and interaction. He grew up in the home of the carpenter for the little Middle-Eastern village of Nazareth. After his father, Joseph, died, he became “the man of the house” and helped his mother raise the rest of the family.

He was an ordinary workman: a “blue-collar” worker . . . If he were to come today as he did then, he could carry out his mission through most any decent and useful occupation. He could be a clerk or accountant in a hardware store, a computer repairman, a banker, an editor, doctor, waiter, teacher, farmhand, lab technician, or construction worker. He could run a housecleaning service or repair automobiles.

In other words, if he were to come today he could very well do what you do. He could very well live in your apartment or house, hold down your job, have your education and life prospects, and live within your family, surroundings, and time. None of this would be the least hindrance to the eternal kind of life that was his by nature and becomes available to us through him. Our human life, it turns out, is not destroyed by God’s life but is fulfilled in it and in it alone.”

- Dallas Willard

december 9, 2020

One of the reasons we think about peace during Advent is because, when we look within and around us, what we see and feel is anything but peace. What we see and feel tends to be just fear, division, worry, violence, and conflict. The ask here isn’t just to try to find peace in the midst of all of that. There’s more to it than that. The ask is to be the peace in the midst of all of that.

Peace is something we do as much as it is something we have. This is why Jesus said, “Blessed are the peace-makers." It’s also why whenever he talked about peace, he would always talk about courage. It takes courage to be a maker of peace. It takes courage to go into those fearful and chaotic places, the ones both in us and around us, and be a source of peace. As we head further towards Christmas, how can you be a maker of peace? What areas of fear and chaos are in or around you and what can you do to bring that peace of God into it?

december 10, 2020

Every place I've ever lived has a part of town where people go all out with their Christmas decorations. In my hometown, that neighbourhood is on a hill and you can pretty much see it from anywhere. Seeing all those lights, whether up close or all the way across town, it does something, doesn’t it? It makes these long cold months a bit warmer. It adds some excitement to the air.

It reminds us that something good and important is coming. Here’s the thing though: the lights we put up for Christmas aren’t the only things that can do that. We can do that too. We can be that sure of warmth and excitement. As we set out to decorate and get our homes ready for Christmas, we can all ask: “How am I getting myself ready for Christmas? What can I do to decorate myself for the holidays? How can I be that light on a hill that brings warmth and excitement?”

december 11, 2020

The Christmas story begins with Mary. She’s young and engaged. She’s dreaming of whatever a young first-century Palestinian woman dreams about. All that to say, her whole life is ahead of her.

But then it happened. Then the angel showed up. Right in the middle of all her excitement, an Angel showed up and asked her to be a part of God’s plan to transform the world back to the way it was always meant to be. Now Mary could say ‘no.’ She has every single reason to say ‘no’ and nobody would be able to blame her. But what does she do? She says ‘yes.’ Despite all the risks and consequences and despite how it would change everything, she said, ‘Yes, let me be the one.’

I know, right? The story about Mary doesn't just give us something to marvel at, it also asks us a question: Will we say ‘yes’ too? Will we also be a part of God’s plans to transform the world? Will we, despite the risk and consequences, say, ‘Yes, let me be the one.’?

That’s the thing about Advent – it’s not just a time of excitement, it’s also a time of preparing to answer the question we get asked each and every Christmas: God is doing something in the world – will you be a part of it?

december 12, 2020

Christmas isn't just for those people who love Christmas. It’s not just for the people who own four different Christmas sweaters, who go all out on the decorations, and whose personalities get turned up to eleven this time of year.

It’s also for people like the Shepherds – these people who weren’t seen as people, who were despised and hated, and who had no community other than the animals they worked with.

It’s also for people like the Magi – these people who were searching for something Bigger Than Themselves but had yet to find it, people who knew something better must be coming, and who would stare at the stars waiting and longing for news of a better world.

It’s for people like King Herod – this King who, with this rumour that a new kind of King and a new kind of world is here, was freaking out about how that might take away all his power and privilege.

It’s for people like the Inn Keeper – this person who was tired, busy, stressed, and anxious about everything they had to do, let alone for their family, and who was moving so fast and was so in the future that they didn’t see the beauty and reverence that was right in front of them. Christmas is also for people like them. It’s for people who are struggling, lost, confused, and hopeless. It’s for anyone who is in need of some hope, joy, peace, and love.

december 13, 2020

My friend John was telling me about this one Advent, after he set up his nativity, putting all the people in the right places, wondering about the conversations they’d all be having, and feeling good with how it all looked, he went to grab a coffee to admire his handiwork and get into the Christmas spirit. But upon returning he noticed something was wrong – baby Jesus was missing. He knew that Jesus was there a moment ago, and he knew it was only baby Jesus so he couldn’t have gone very far, so he looked on the floor and by the coffee machine, and just when he was thinking he was going crazy, he heard this maniacal laugh coming from upstairs, followed by the toilet flushing.

Forgetting all about the missing baby Jesus, John ran upstairs to find his three-year-old daughter laughing hysterically as she watched baby Jesus swirl around the toilet bowl with each flush. After fishing him out of the toilet, he realized his daughter was asking him a really profound theological question that we all need to ask this time of year: Why do we need Jesus?

december 14, 2020

"Jesus wasn’t born simply to tell us to love one another. He wasn’t executed on a Roman cross simply because he preached a message of love. Nor was he resurrected to conquer those who killed him. He was born, he was killed, and he rose again to subvert the whole theological and political system of violence with God’s nonviolent love. He reveals the absurdity of believing that the means of violence can achieve the goal of peace. As Marcus Borg and Dominic Crossan write, the “terrible truth is that our world has never established peace through victory. Victory establishes not peace, but lull. Thereafter, violence returns once again, and always worse than before. And it is that escalator violence that endangers our world."

That’s why Christmas is subversive. December 25 demands that we make a theological and political decision. We will either decide to follow the “Unconquered Sun” who falsely promises peace through violence, or we will follow Jesus, the “Conquered Son,” who brings peace through self-sacrificial and nonviolent love.”

- Adam Ericksen

december 15, 2020

Advent not only gets us to think about hope and peace, it also gets us to think about joy. When we talk about joy, we’re not talking about happiness. We’re going deeper and wider than that. We’re not even talking about an emotion. We’re talking about those gifted moments of feeling truly and fully alive.

Maybe you know those moments. We’re talking about those times when you look at the clock after being with friends and realize that hours have passed; we’re talking about those spontaneous dance parties in the kitchen; we’re talking that feeling of getting abducted by wonder; we’re talking about all those times when, despite it all, we feel the goodness of being alive.

So why’s this joy connected to Christmas? Good question. As Willie Jennings said, "Joy is an act of resistance against despair and its forces.” If Christmas is about anything, it’s about God’s movement against all the forces of despair in our world. Joy is an act of resistance because it reminds us that despite all the things telling us otherwise, we are still here and it is not over yet.

december 16, 2020

They are probably the most overlooked character in the whole Christmas story, which is a shame because they have something really important to say to us. Out of all the characters in the story, the Inn Keeper is the one who gets brushed aside. They come across more as a plot device than anything else – a reason to explain why Mary and Joe had to have their baby in a barn instead of somewhere at least somewhat respectable like a motel room. The reason, we’re told, is that there’s “no room in the Inn." The neon ‘No Vacancy’ sign is lit up because everyone’s in town to be counted for the census. Needless to say, the Inn Keeper is busy. There are rooms to clean. People to check in. Meals to make. Clean towels to deliver. Then, in the middle of having to figure out who would get the last cot and trying to fix the credit card machine, this young and very pregnant couple shows up asking for a place to stay. And the poor Inn Keeper, with so much on their mind and rushing from one thing to the next, missed how the air changed when they walked in; they didn't notice how the world pulsed when the baby kicked; they didn’t hear the Divine whisper, “Look after these folks for me;” they didn’t notice because, as Fred Buechner imagines, they were too busy. Now they did, God bless ‘em, give the couple a room in the barn, but I have to wonder, what would have happened if they slowed down to notice the reverence ... what would have happened if they didn't have so much on their minds?

Christmas is always a busy time that gives us a lot to think about: gifts, cards, baking, plans, decorating. That’s on top of all the stuff we’re already consumed with. This is where that something really important kicks in: What if we are that Inn Keeper? What if we are so busy and have so much on our minds that we miss out on the very thing Christmas is about?

december 17, 2020

There was a kid in my school who thought she was smarter than everyone else and wouldn’t resist an opportunity to let everyone know. Ironically, her name was Joy. During one Christmas pageant, right after we all sang Frosty the Snowman, she stood up in front of everyone and yelled, “IMPOSSIBLE! Snowmen DON’T come alive.” I’m sure if the teachers had let her, she would have gone on: reindeer don’t fly, Santa can't fit down chimneys, underwear could never be considered a good gift, and perhaps most obvious of all: God can’t become a baby.

Hopefully Joy has discovered this by now, but that’s kind of the point of Christmas. Christmas is all about shattered impossibilities: it’s about how all the things that feel so insurmountable, overwhelming, and fixed don’t actually get the last word. It’s about how the impossible can and does actually happen. If Christmas is about the shattering of impossibility, then the meaning of Advent becomes the time when we look at what we’ve surrendered to, what’s forced us to give up and back down, and remember: the impossible happens and we don't need to live like it doesn’t.

december 18, 2020

Every holiday season in this old Jewish neighbourhood in Chicago, the same story gets told: On the first night of Hanukkah, a menorah appeared in the window of one of the homes. The next morning, however, the front door of that home bore a large, crudely painted swastika. Despite that, the following evening a second candle appeared in that window and another menorah was now in a window across the street. The next morning the second home also had a swastika on the door. On the third evening, three candles burned in the window of the first home, and now menorahs had shown up in the front windows of half a dozen homes round about. Next morning, six more swastikas. By the fourth evening, menorahs beamed light from the windows of homes all up and down that street. The next day? No more swastikas. Light had chased away the darkness.

december 19, 2020

Christmas is when we reflect on the mystery of the incarnation – this idea that God became human in Jesus. There’s really no point in wondering about the ‘how.’ It’ll just leave you frustrated and being frustrated is the easiest way to miss out on the whole point of the incarnation: that because God became a human and lived among us, God knows what being human is like.

Think about that for a minute: because God became human, because God experienced life from birth to death, God ceases to be a God that's far away and out of touch with our reality. Because God became human, God can look at us when we are down in the dirt, experiencing all the frailty life has to offer, and as we struggle with addictions, divorce, depression, loss, pain, hunger and stress, God can kneel down, look us in the eye and say, in full sincerity: ‘I know how that feels. I understand. Me too.’

Christmas is when we celebrate how, out of and for love, God moved to be with us – not just in proximity, but in solidarity and love. As we celebrate that movement, one of the questions we need to ask is, 'How can we do the same?' Who are the people we need to move closer to? Who can we practice empathy with? How can we show our solidarity with those who are far away from us?

december 20, 2020

The shepherds were some of the first people to hear that Christmas was about to go down. This is a big deal. This is one of those shocking parts of the story we just don’t pick up on anymore. In Jesus’ day, shepherds were seen as the worst of the worst: they were considered all around bad dudes that you would avoid at all costs. They were the people your mom spent all night worrying about. It makes you wonder that out of all the people the angels could have appeared to, why them? Why not someone more respectable? Why not someone people would have seen as worthy as getting such news? Why would the worst of the worst, the lowest of the low, and the most marginalized group be the ones to hear the angels say Jesus is being born? The answer to that is in the question. Because that message was for them too.

The truth is, Christmas is for everyone. It’s not just for the churchy, polite, nice looking, respectable folk. It’s for everyone. It makes you wonder: Who have we shut out of Christmas? Who, if Christmas happened all over again, would the angels come to? Who do we need to listen to and welcome in because they might have a message we need to hear?

december 21, 2020

There's a reason that love is the last thing we reflect on during Advent. It’s not just any love. It’s God’s love. It’s the love that’s in and underneath all the other things we reflect on during Advent. It’s the love we see embodied in Jesus: extravagant and indiscriminate love. When you think about that kind of love, what do you think about? I think of a love that moves and comes alongside. It’s a love that, regardless of the space between, moves and comes alongside us because … well, that’s what love does. It moves to be with.

One of the most beautiful things about Christmas is how it tells us God is a God who moves to be with. Maybe we need to hear that this year because it’s so easy to feel alone these days. Even if we’re surrounded by family, with all that’s going on, it can be so easy to feel alone. And it’s to us who feel alone, to us who feel so overwhelmed and little, that Christmas says: “I am here. I am with you. I am love.” What can you do to embrace that love and feel the God who has moved to be with you?

december 22, 2020

There’s this story about how, a couple years ago, for no reason anyone can figure out, in the weeks before Christmas over 1000 letters addressed to Santa got delivered to a small apartment in Brooklyn. Now at first, the people living there thought it was a joke but as they started to read them they discovered that sure enough, they were all real legit letters to Santa, all of them from kids in their neighbourhood. Now this neighbourhood was really poor. The only presents these kids would get would be the ones from Santa. So knowing that Christmas was just a couple weeks away and that Christmas wouldn’t happen if these letters didn’t get answered, the people who lived in that apartment asked their family and friends to be Santa and get the gifts the kids asked for. Word of what they were doing spread and soon people all over the city were volunteering to help make Christmas happen for those kids. They got so much help that every single kid ended up having something under the tree on Christmas morning. Christmas isn’t something that happened. It’s something that happens. It’s something that happens whenever things like light and joy overcome darkness and despair. With just a couple days left, how can you help make Christmas happen?

december 23, 2020

Let’s talk about the three people “from afar" who showed up at the manger. Usually they are called Wise Men or Kings. It all depends on which Gospel you read, how you want to interpret it, and how patriarchal you want to get. But the most accurate word would be ‘Magi,’ wisdom seekers. In any case, they show up with rather inappropriate gifts for the young family. But the most interesting part of their story is what happens before they showed up at manger.

Before finding baby Jesus, they have a run-in with King Herod. Now Herod is a really bad dude. He wants to kill baby Jesus because he not only poses a threat to him and his power, but also to the violent and oppressive Empire he represents. The Magi know this. And so when Herod asks them to let him know where they find Jesus, despite the fact that it would put them in the crosshairs of the Empire, they decide to trick the King and sneak out of town. Their story is a challenging one because it reminds us that we too must do what we can to protect the Life and Love of God, even when it means risking everything and going up against powerful forces in our world.

december 24, 2020

My favourite part of Christmas Eve is when everything is done, the tree lights are on, and things are quiet and still. It’s there that a question rises up for me, one that all of Advent is preparing me to answer, one that will help me make the most of that liberating and revolutionary gift that Christmas is, one that, depending on how I answer it, has the possibility to change everything.

It’s a powerful question for one that only has three words. As you encounter that quiet and stillness this Christmas Eve, I invite you to let this question rise up within you:

Are you ready?