It’s the most wonderful time of the year! Not because of sentimental familiar songs and the shopping craze that consumes our society. It’s the most wonderful time of the year because it’s the time where we as the church slows down and are again astonished at the story of redemption.
Advent is the season where we remember that God is indeed the one who creates salvation. Salvation does not come from our efforts or abilities, salvation does not come through our own intuitiveness and wisdom. God’s salvation had to come down to us. And our Savior came down to us in the most unlikely counterintuitive way we could construe: born in humility, born in our likeness. Advent is the season where we stop and remember that our hope is not in human progress but in another coming, another intervention when Jesus will come to make all things new.
This Advent season at CPC we are distributing the devotional book, The Gospel Came to You, written by our very own Mike Pettengill, that is intended to guide you in your individual and family meditations on the glorious work of Christ in his incarnation. Make sure and pick up a copy for your family by next Sunday so that you can enter this season prayerfully and joyfully mindful of the true reason for the season. As Mike puts it, “In our modern busy lives advent is an opportunity for Christians to slow down and remember the real purpose for Christmas is not parties, gifts and ski trips, but is about honoring the birth of our risen King.”
