Expectation


Well I am in the middle of planning the first two sunday's in Advent. The theme for Advent this year is "Coming Home" and we are using the story of the Prodigal Son in Luke as the Advent theme text. Because I have the first two sunday's it has fallen upon me to imbue the congregation with a sense of festivity as well as to prepare them for the services that lie ahead. My sermon on the 27th is going to be about how to recognize when it is time to come home. I am focusing on the first several verses of the parable when the son realizes he could live better at home. What I am going to try and bring out is that as a church we can be a family for those that have none. In fact we should be the best example of a family possible. I think that this will go over well with the congregation but it remains to be seen.

The 4th of December will be the most difficult service to bring about. The reasons are varied but basically what it boils down to is that this service is going to be an attempt at mimicking an informal family gathering. That sunday we are decorating the church as part of the service, the sermon is going to be changed into a short lesson, and we are going to have a carol sing. Whats going to be hard about this is that the majority of the congregation are older people who show up well dressed every sunday. Theres nothing wrong with that and I fully support it but this sunday in particular we want to encourage a sense of a family decorating their home for the holiday. Because of the emphasis we have on family I am encouraging people to wear their pajamas or just dress down in whatever they would wear at home. We'll see if this happens, and I am hopeful that it will.

Update: Well the idea with the 4th didn't go through. To speak honesly I didn't expect it to and in some way's I'm relived that it didn't. We may still be doing a casual sunday which would be nice with the theme. What I hope my suggestion did was to encourage people to re-evaluate what can and cannot be done in church. I hope they will try and look out of the box rather than acting like they can't do something. We'll no problem on to the next task :)

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