Advent Reflections 2019

A Council for World Mission Publication

NEVER GET WEARY YET Advent Reflections 2019

In collaboration with Rev Tokerau Josephs, Presbyterian Church of Aotearoa New Zealand (PCANZ)

Advent is the period marked out by the four Sundays before Christmas where we prepare for the Lord’s coming in to the arms of Mary and into the hearts of our lives and systems.

CWM invites you to reflect through Advent on the steps we need to take to rise up for peace and justice. This is particularly important as CWM looks to 2020 as a year where we make our apology and repent of our past complicities with enslavement and look to how we can rise up with Jesus in seeking racial justice. Some of the text is emboldened should this be used in a group setting, when people can respond in several voices. Where this is used in private reflection then this can be ignored.

Preface Unwearied and upheld let us take again the way to Bethlehem, Turn to the ever-increasing dawn and the cries of a new born child.

Let us rise up from our comfortable places and start again in a journey that steps out into hope and step by step reveals the path of justice and peace God takes amongst the downtrodden.

In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. All went to their own towns to be registered. Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called Bethlehem, because he was descended from the house and family of David. He went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child.

Luke 2: 1 – 5 (NRSV)

Artwork via https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/AapkBiXzhdAeEzAodldzBdcbMJMLD8rkYe2dHpskzQyK1EYnxepaZAw/

In this Advent season, we wait in hope for the innocent one born into the legacies and histories of hurt and hatred.

For one whose new life Begins to right the wrongs of the past And confront the injustices of today.

In this season of Advent, we wait in hope for God to upend empires through a vulnerable child.

For the one who takes the side Of the downtrodden to rise up in new life and power In this season of Advent, we wait in hope for the one who breaks the chains.

We wait in hope for the one who shares our hope and whose liberating Spirit redeems our humanity.

Musical moment Sing an Advent hymn or song or listen to music.

An option might be to listen to ‘Never get Weary yet’ by Toots and the Maytals.

https://www.youtube. com/watch?v=R62Sk6sBBRA Millennials participating in a Black Lives Matter protest. Photo by Johnny Silvercloud

Litany at the candle A new life is promised A new dawn is coming The way of the Lord is before us.

Let us repent of the sins and structures Whose legacies enchain us in hurt and hatred And live as Christ calls us.

We light the way to the manger To rise up against discrimination And proclaim: [The following are to be read according to the date]

carrara

Advent 1 Dec 1st 2019

You ascended the high mount, leading captives in your train and receiving gifts from people, even from those who rebel against the Lord God’s abiding there.

Blessed be the Lord, who daily bears us up; God is our salvation.

Our God is a God of salvation, and to God, the Lord, belongs escape from death.

Psalm 68: 18 – 20

Advent 2 Dec 8th 2019 Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees.

Say to those who are of a fearful heart, ‘Be strong, do not fear!

Here is your God. He will come with vengeance, with terrible recompense.

He will come and save you.’ Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy.

For waters shall break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert Isaiah 35: 4-6

Advent 3 Dec 15th 2019

Freeing of the Slaves by John Steuart Curry (1897-1946). COM:TAG United States

Thus says God, the Lord, who created the heavens and stretched them out, who spread out the earth and what comes from it, who gives breath to the people upon it and spirit to those who walk in it: I am the Lord, I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by the hand and kept you; I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness Isaiah 42: 5 – 7

Advent 4 Dec 22nd 2019

Get you up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good tidings; lift up your voice with strength, O Jerusalem, herald of good tidings, lift it up, do not fear; say to the cities of Judah, ‘Here is your God!’ See, the Lord God comes with might, and his arm rules for him; his reward is with him, and his recompense before him.

He will feed his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms, and carry them in his bosom, and gently lead the mother sheep Isaiah 40: 9 – 11

Christmas Day

For a child has been born for us, a son given to us; authority rests upon his shoulders; and he is named Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

His authority shall grow continually, and there shall be endless peace for the throne of David and his kingdom.

He will establish and uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time onwards and for evermore.

The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this Isaiah 9:6-7

Candle lighting Let this light shine and grow As we repent of the wrong we do And the injustice we prosper from And embrace the changes to our lives and systems Christ demands Keep a moment of quiet

Closing AďŹƒrmation Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the chains of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke?

Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover them, and not to hide yourself from your own kin?

Then your light shall break forth like the dawn Isaiah 58: 6 – 8 When the powerful tell us we should be silent and give up God never gets weary singing new songs of freedom.

When hope lies in tatters at our feet because of oppression: God never gets weary mending our brokenness with love.

When we think nothing can ever change for the better: God never gets weary giving us life in all fullness.

God never gets weary yet.

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