Advent Conspiracy
Advent Conspiracy - I know it's a little late for this but remember this for next year!
Showing posts with label advent. Show all posts
Showing posts with label advent. Show all posts
The Advent Conspiracy!
The US-based movement Advent Conspiracy is inviting churches around the world to observe the Christmas season with a little less glitter, a little less debt and a lot more love.
Hundreds of churches in the US and now some in the UK and Africa are joining the movement to de-commercialise Christmas and restore it back to its true purpose of celebrating the birth of Christ.
"What if Christmas became a world-changing event again?" the creators of Advent Conspiracy pose. Everyone wants Christmas to be meaningful but instead it becomes shop, shop, shop, credit cards, traffic jams, to do lists, useless gifts, then off to church," says a promotional video. In the end, people are just left with debt, gifts to return and an empty feeling of missed purpose.
For many, including pastors, Christmas has become a painful holiday especially when trying to lead their congregations in worship amid the distractions and stress of the consumer culture.
"[We] lamented that we hated Christmas," said Pastor Rick McKinley of Imago Dei Community Church in Portland, Oregon, during his latest sermon on Sunday. We hated the fact that we were talking about one of the pinnacles of theology – that here is God becoming flesh and entering our world to bring salvation and peace and restore His whole creation, While we preach and declare and get all excited about that, the truth is the message just becomes white noise because within our cultural context there's so much hecticness that's involved around the holidays," he added.
On top of the consumer culture, Christians have not effectively conveyed the message of Christmas to the public.
"We started looking at what the Church's response has been," McKinley said as he recalled what he and a few other pastors discussed three years ago. "It has been to critique the culture for not talking about Jesus or saying Merry Christmas. So there's this idea that when I'm running through the mall ... [people] should tell me Merry Christmas, not Happy Holidays. That's a very lame place for the church to draw a line in the sand," the Portland church pastor said.
Hundreds of churches in the US and now some in the UK and Africa are joining the movement to de-commercialise Christmas and restore it back to its true purpose of celebrating the birth of Christ."What if Christmas became a world-changing event again?" the creators of Advent Conspiracy pose. Everyone wants Christmas to be meaningful but instead it becomes shop, shop, shop, credit cards, traffic jams, to do lists, useless gifts, then off to church," says a promotional video. In the end, people are just left with debt, gifts to return and an empty feeling of missed purpose.
For many, including pastors, Christmas has become a painful holiday especially when trying to lead their congregations in worship amid the distractions and stress of the consumer culture.
"[We] lamented that we hated Christmas," said Pastor Rick McKinley of Imago Dei Community Church in Portland, Oregon, during his latest sermon on Sunday. We hated the fact that we were talking about one of the pinnacles of theology – that here is God becoming flesh and entering our world to bring salvation and peace and restore His whole creation, While we preach and declare and get all excited about that, the truth is the message just becomes white noise because within our cultural context there's so much hecticness that's involved around the holidays," he added.
On top of the consumer culture, Christians have not effectively conveyed the message of Christmas to the public.
"We started looking at what the Church's response has been," McKinley said as he recalled what he and a few other pastors discussed three years ago. "It has been to critique the culture for not talking about Jesus or saying Merry Christmas. So there's this idea that when I'm running through the mall ... [people] should tell me Merry Christmas, not Happy Holidays. That's a very lame place for the church to draw a line in the sand," the Portland church pastor said.
Advent
All About Celebrating Advent
Advent is a spiritual season of preparation before Christmas celebrated by many Christians. In Western Christianity, the season of Advent begins on the fourth Sunday prior to Christmas Day, or the Sunday which falls closest to November 30, and lasts through Christmas Eve, or December 24.
What is Advent?
Advent is a period of spiritual preparation in which many Christians make themselves ready for the coming, or birth, of the Lord, Jesus Christ. During this time, Christians observe a season of prayer, fasting and repentance, followed by anticipation, hope and joy.
Many Christians celebrate advent not only by thanking God for Christ's first coming to Earth as a baby, but also for his presence among us today through the Holy Spirit, and in preparation and anticipation of his final coming at the end of time.
The Advent Calendar
The Advent Calendar has been around for more than 150 years and becomes more popular every year. The origin of the calendar, like so many of our Christmas traditions, started in Germany back in the 19th century. Different methods of counting down the days to the celebration of Christmas were used. Drawing a chalk line to mark off the days, later lighting a candle every night or putting up small religious pictures marked each day until Christmas. The first printed calendar was produced by Gerhard Lang in Germany. When he was a child, his mother attached little candies to a piece of cardboard and each day Gerhard would take one off. His first (printed) calendar consisted of miniature colored pictures that would be attached to a piece of cardboard each day in December. Later Advent calendars were made with little doors to open on each day. The child might find a small piece of candy, a Christmas picture, a religious picture or a bible verse.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
