Week 4 of the ADVENT-ure

Week 4 (December 23 - Fourth Sunday of Advent – Christmas, December 25)

An Advent Reflection:

The Mustard Seed in Edmonton calls a 100 year old church its home. Originally home to the congregation of Central Baptist Church, later becoming home to a country and western bar, and most recently home to the Mustard Seed, the building has seen many different types of community happen under its roof over the past 100 years.

Today we see anywhere between 200 and 400 people every day coming through our doors looking for ways to meet their needs. Perhaps they have physical need like food, shelter, warmth, or clothing. They may have emotional need too, perhaps they are lonely, lost, or hopeless and they have arrived to see if they can find the care they need for their hearts. We see all kinds of poverty here. We see physical poverty, spiritual poverty, economic poverty, bodily poverty, mental poverty, cultural poverty, political poverty, and societal poverty. Though we don’t hold a formal church service here anymore, I often say that I think we do “church” here every day, sometimes even kind of like it describes in Acts 42-47.

Advent is drawing to a conclusion this week. Tomorrow, Christmas will be here. For many of our community members, they are wrapped up so deeply in poverty, that this great occasion of celebration that we have spent the last four weeks preparing for, will simply go by unnoticed; just another day. For others will be one of the most painful days of the year; a day of feeling the pain of having no place to call home and no people to call their own.

Today we invite you to have the eyes to see people in poverty in your life. People who are experiencing some type of poverty; physical or otherwise, and invite them into a place where they can belong.

Author and advocate Chris Heuertz shares a beautiful and touching story about seeing Christ here on earth in the clip Remembering Mary and Joseph, check it out:  http://vimeo.com/33829623

An Advent Invitation: (an idea for getting active during the advent season)

Help us continue to be a place that provides a place for people to belong. By supporting the Mustard Seed, you are helping us to provide homes for people who need them, and fostering community for those seeking a place to belong. Visit our website for more information:  http://www.theseed.ca/christmas.html

Have you had an advent reflection of your own to share? Write a blog for us and submit it to: JenniferFast@theseed.ca to be posted on our blog.

Prayers for Advent:

This week please pray for all the people in our community who struggle with the holiday season. That the love of God would bring peace and comfort to them in difficult times.

Please pray that we would be able to provide a community that everyone who walks through our doors would feel appreciated and accepted in, and that the love of God would be present in our work.

Jesus you are the Prince of Peace, you are the Justice of the Father. Grant us the courage to emulate your ministry by bringing healing to all our relationships. Grant us the wisdom to know what is pleasing to your Father.

A Prayer Excerpt from Common Book of Prayer: A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals:

Christ is coming. Christ has come. Christ will come again.

Psalm 104:32-37 Isaiah 10:20-27 Luke 1:26-38

Christ is coming. Christ has come. Christ will come again.

Thank you Lord that your promises are not for some distant future but are to be claimed right now, today. Teach us what we must do and say in our local communities and in our larger world to participate in your promise. Amen.

A big Merry Christmas from all of us at the Mustard Seed, check it out here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKZcvICpzS4&feature=share

The advent season has come to a close, but follow our twitter feed (@mustardseedyeg) and our blog for more thought provoking reflections throughout the year----- Subscribe to The Mustard Seed Blog via RSS