Pick up your Advent Devotional booklet and bag at Connection Central, or in the main office if you can’t make it on Sunday.

We are excited to share this Advent Devotional book with you. Advent includes the four weeks leading up to Christmas, starting on Sunday, November 28th this year and ending on Christmas Eve. Advent is the first season in the church calendar and literally means “coming.” It is centered on preparation and anticipation for the birth of Jesus and the second coming of Christ. This season is traditionally honored through times of fasting, repentance, silence, prayer, and almsgiving as we prepare our hearts and community to receive the coming of Christ.

We chose the theme "Preparing for Our Guest” because we thought it would be fitting to continue to reflect on how we are preparing for the arrival of the Christ child into our hearts and homes this season. When someone is coming to visit us, how do we prepare? What does our anticipation and excitement look like for the impending visit? How do we clean? How do we show hospitality to our guests? How do we rejoice when they are finally with us? This Advent we are preparing for the Christ child to enter our world and enter our homes. Will we be ready to welcome Him?

Each of the devotionals has an embodied element to them as Advent and our Christian life is very “fleshy.” Our God took on flesh to become one of us, so we wanted to involve our senses and our physical bodies in our preparation for Christ’s coming. Each of the objects included in your Advent bags are meant to involve your senses in some way and assist you in your embodied preparations for this season. We encourage you to reflect on the devotional/activity for each week as it corresponds to what the pastor will be preaching on during the Sundays of Advent.

The Lord has come and made His dwelling among us. Are we ready to be changed and transformed by this guest of all guests, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ?!