Resources for Advent

This year, in addition to Advent resources with which I have been involved, I also want to share information about ‘Wonder in the Waiting’ - an Advent Jazz Vespers which gives space to gather, stop and wait over the busy Christmas period. This candlelight and musical gathering is interspersed with carols, Advent-themed artwork and reflective readings.

NOW AVAILABLE TO DOWNLOAD:

• Music demonstration tracks
• Music backing tracks
• Sheet music and lyric sheet
• Script and supporting slideshow
• Leader's notes

Major Richard Mingay has provided six Christmas arrangements; five are traditional carols and one is an original song written especially for this publication. All the arrangements are set in the jazz genre and are designed to have flexible instrumentation. The songs can work effectively with just piano accompaniment or with the addition of drum kit, bass, and instrumentalist. 

'Come, Lord Jesus, Come' is an Advent devotional (booklet & slideshow) by Victoria Emily Jones based on an Advent meditation written by myself. Each line of the meditation focuses on one aspect of Christ’s coming. To promote deeper reflection on all these aspects, Victoria has selected twenty-four art images to lead the way in stoking our imaginations and to provide entry points into prayer. She has taken special care to present art from around the world and, where possible, by modern or contemporary artists so that we will be stretched beyond the familiar imagery of the season.

Victoria writes: 'Art is a great way to open yourself up to the mysteries of God, to sit in the pocket of them as you gaze and ponder. “Blessed are your eyes because they see,” Jesus said. Theologians in their own right, artists are committed to helping us see what was and what is and what could be. Here I’ve taken special care to select images by artists from around the world, not just the West, and ones that go beyond the familiar fare. You’ll see, for example, the Holy Spirit depositing the divine seed into Mary’s womb; Mary with a baby bump, and then with midwives; an outback birth with kangaroos, emus, and lizards in attendance; Jesus as a Filipino slum dweller; and Quaker history married to Isaiah’s vision of the Peaceable Kingdom.'

Through 'Come, Lord Jesus, Come' you are invited to consider what it meant for Jesus to be born of woman—coming as seed and fetus and birthed son; the poverty Jesus shared with children around the world; culturally specific bodies of Christ, like a dancing body and a yogic body; how we are called to bear God into the world today; and more.

Victoria writes: 'Advent takes us back and brings us forward. In preparing us to celebrate Christ’s first coming, it places us alongside the ancient prophets, who awaited with aching intensity the fulfilled promise of a messiah, and Joseph and Mary, whose pregnancy made the expectation all the more palpable; it also strengthens our longing for Christ’s second coming, when he will return to fully and finally establish his kingdom on earth ... May God bless you this Advent season as you ponder the amazing truth of the Incarnation.'

My 'Love is ...' meditation for Advent can be found by clicking here. This meditation ponders the love Mary demonstrated at various points along the way from the announcement of Jesus’s conception to her and her family’s resettlement in Egypt.

Additionally, I have a series of poetic meditations which draw on the thinking of René Girard in interpreting the Bible readings traditionally used in services of Nine Lessons and Carols. This set of Alternative Nine Lessons and Carols meditations can be found by clicking here.

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Richard Mingay - In This Light.

Resources for Advent

'Come, Lord Jesus, Come' is an Advent devotional (booklet & slideshow) by Victoria Emily Jones based on an Advent meditation written by myself. Each line of the meditation focuses on one aspect of Christ’s coming. To promote deeper reflection on all these aspects, Victoria has selected twenty-four art images to lead the way in stoking our imaginations and to provide entry points into prayer. She has taken special care to present art from around the world and, where possible, by modern or contemporary artists so that we will be stretched beyond the familiar imagery of the season.

Victoria writes: 'Art is a great way to open yourself up to the mysteries of God, to sit in the pocket of them as you gaze and ponder. “Blessed are your eyes because they see,” Jesus said. Theologians in their own right, artists are committed to helping us see what was and what is and what could be. Here I’ve taken special care to select images by artists from around the world, not just the West, and ones that go beyond the familiar fare. You’ll see, for example, the Holy Spirit depositing the divine seed into Mary’s womb; Mary with a baby bump, and then with midwives; an outback birth with kangaroos, emus, and lizards in attendance; Jesus as a Filipino slum dweller; and Quaker history married to Isaiah’s vision of the Peaceable Kingdom.'

Through 'Come, Lord Jesus, Come' you are invited to consider what it meant for Jesus to be born of woman—coming as seed and fetus and birthed son; the poverty Jesus shared with children around the world; culturally specific bodies of Christ, like a dancing body and a yogic body; how we are called to bear God into the world today; and more.

Victoria writes: 'Advent takes us back and brings us forward. In preparing us to celebrate Christ’s first coming, it places us alongside the ancient prophets, who awaited with aching intensity the fulfilled promise of a messiah, and Joseph and Mary, whose pregnancy made the expectation all the more palpable; it also strengthens our longing for Christ’s second coming, when he will return to fully and finally establish his kingdom on earth ... May God bless you this Advent season as you ponder the amazing truth of the Incarnation.'

My 'Love is ...' meditation for Advent can be found by clicking here.

Additionally, I have a series of poetic meditations which draw on the thinking of René Girard in interpreting the Bible readings traditionally used in services of Nine Lessons and Carols. This set of Alternative Nine Lessons and Carols meditations can be found by clicking here.

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J. Lind - Generous.

Advent and Christmas resources

'Come, Lord Jesus, Come' is an Advent devotional (booklet & slideshow) by Victoria Emily Jones based on an Advent meditation written by myself. Each line of the meditation focuses on one aspect of Christ’s coming. To promote deeper reflection on all these aspects, Victoria has selected twenty-four art images to lead the way in stoking our imaginations and to provide entry points into prayer. She has taken special care to present art from around the world and, where possible, by modern or contemporary artists so that we will be stretched beyond the familiar imagery of the season.

Victoria writes: 'Art is a great way to open yourself up to the mysteries of God, to sit in the pocket of them as you gaze and ponder. “Blessed are your eyes because they see,” Jesus said. Theologians in their own right, artists are committed to helping us see what was and what is and what could be. Here I’ve taken special care to select images by artists from around the world, not just the West, and ones that go beyond the familiar fare. You’ll see, for example, the Holy Spirit depositing the divine seed into Mary’s womb; Mary with a baby bump, and then with midwives; an outback birth with kangaroos, emus, and lizards in attendance; Jesus as a Filipino slum dweller; and Quaker history married to Isaiah’s vision of the Peaceable Kingdom.'

Through 'Come, Lord Jesus, Come' you are invited to consider what it meant for Jesus to be born of woman—coming as seed and fetus and birthed son; the poverty Jesus shared with children around the world; culturally specific bodies of Christ, like a dancing body and a yogic body; how we are called to bear God into the world today; and more.

Victoria writes: 'Advent takes us back and brings us forward. In preparing us to celebrate Christ’s first coming, it places us alongside the ancient prophets, who awaited with aching intensity the fulfilled promise of a messiah, and Joseph and Mary, whose pregnancy made the expectation all the more palpable; it also strengthens our longing for Christ’s second coming, when he will return to fully and finally establish his kingdom on earth ... May God bless you this Advent season as you ponder the amazing truth of the Incarnation.' 

The alternative Nine Lessons (see below) is a poetic meditation drawing on the thinking of René Girard in interpreting the Bible readings traditionally used in services of Nine Lessons and Carols:

Nine Lessons

Genesis 3: 8–19

Hard labour in birth and work, sweat on our brow,
dirt on our hands. Thorns and thistles to prick and sting,
like death from a serpent's tongue,
till we return to the ground,
ashes to dust and dust to ashes.

Genesis 22: 15–18

A sense of sacrifice required;
the death of children appeasing the divine.
An alternative is found - ram caught in thicket,
wool held by thorns. Animals become
the scapegoats for our sins.

Isaiah 9: 2; 6–7

Light in darkness promised
through the hard labour of the birth of a child.
A child bearing peace and goodwill,
bringing justice and righteousness
without end and without measure.

Isaiah 11: 1–3a; 4a; 6–9

A little child leading us to reconciliation.
From nature red in tooth and claw -
survival of the fittest - to peaceful co-existence.
Carnivores to herbivores, the drawing of the sting
from the serpent's tongue.

Luke 1: 26–35; 38

Highly favoured as the Spirit overshadows.
A virgin birth - subverting patriarchy -
of a son who will not marry or have blood offspring.
The saying of 'yes' to God opening
the way of the family of God to one and all.

Luke 2: 1; 3–7

No room for the Lord of life, Prince of peace.
Space shared with animals kept for sustenance;
the sacrifices of existence and forgiveness.
Born into poverty; the struggle for survival
that this child will one day redeem.

Luke 2: 8–16

Angelic announcement of peace and goodwill
come in the form of the child found
by night workers, swaddled and lying in a manger.
His mother ponders these things -
annunciation, nativity, incarnation - in her heart.

Matthew 2: 1–12

Star following Magi look for the Prince of Peace
in the heart of power and opulence
only to find him in obscurity and humility.
Gifts given prefigure his divinity and sacrifice, the servant King
who, in birth and death, gives his life for others.

John 1: 1–14

Creative word now created, enfleshed, incarnated.
Divine life flowing in and through this child.
Light in darkness, revealing our passion
for power, position and personal gain.
In poverty, a counterpoint is born - compassion.

Giles Fraser, in the wake of the death of Girard and the Paris attacks, recently summarised Girard's thinking:

'The anthropologist René Girard died earlier this month, at home in California. A Frenchman, he did not live to see the latest violence in his home country. But, in a sense, he had been working on it his entire professional life. For no modern thinker has done more to understand the self-repeating patterns through which violence flows. And there can be no more disturbing conclusion than his, especially now: that violence is a form of copying, that violence is contagious, and that, as he put it: “Violence is like a raging fire that feeds on the very objects intended to smother its flames.”'

'Girard’s answer to mimetic violence is that we must break the cycle by refusing to mirror our enemies. Indeed, his rejection of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth is not hand-wringing pacifism – it is bloody-minded, hard-nosed defiance; a refusal to be defined by the violent other, a refusal to answer back in kind.'

'Girard goes on to argue that the most vociferous critic of religion turns out to be a Jewish prophet called Jesus of Nazareth. Girard understands the ministry of Jesus to be that of deliberately standing in the place of the innocent victim thus to reveal the profound wickedness of the whole scapegoat mechanism. And as he is strung up to die, the violence of religion is exposed in all its gruesome destructiveness. Forget Dawkins or Harris – according to Girard the greatest critic of religion was Jesus himself.'

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Low - If You Were Born Today.

Concrete crucifixions

For The Cross: designs & reflections exhibition by commission4mission in The Hostry at Norwich Cathedral I have visually reworked the poetic meditations I wrote for The Passion and those based on the Nine Lessons & Carols readings. Following the inspiration of concrete poetry, I have re-designed both meditations into cross shaped sequences which then explore the cross in content and design. 

The Passion: Reflections & prayers features pictures, poems and prayers by Henry Shelton and I which enable us to follow Jesus on his journey to the cross reflecting both on the significance and the pain of that journey as we do so and published as a double-sided A3 sheet with all the images, haiku-like meditations and prayers laid out in sequence for ease of devotional use.

My alternative Nine Lessons are poetic meditations drawing on the thinking of René Girard in interpreting the Bible readings traditionally used in services of Nine Lessons and Carols.

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Larry Norman - Be Careful What You Sign.

Alternative Nine Lessons & Carols

Last year I wrote a poetic meditation drawing on the thinking of René Girard in interpreting the Bible readings traditionally used in services of Nine Lessons and Carols:

Nine Lessons

Genesis 3: 8–19

Hard labour in birth and work, sweat on our brow,
dirt on our hands. Thorns and thistles to prick and sting,
like death from a serpent's tongue,
till we return to the ground,
ashes to dust and dust to ashes.

Genesis 22: 15–18

A sense of sacrifice required;
the death of children appeasing the divine.
An alternative is found - ram caught in thicket,
wool held by thorns. Animals become
the scapegoats for our sins.

Isaiah 9: 2; 6–7

Light in darkness promised
through the hard labour of the birth of a child.
A child bearing peace and goodwill,
bringing justice and righteousness
without end and without measure.

Isaiah 11: 1–3a; 4a; 6–9

A little child leading us to reconciliation.
From nature red in tooth and claw -
survival of the fittest - to peaceful co-existence.
Carnivores to herbivores, the drawing of the sting
from the serpent's tongue.

Luke 1: 26–35; 38

Highly favoured as the Spirit overshadows.
A virgin birth - subverting patriarchy -
of a son who will not marry or have blood offspring.
The saying of 'yes' to God opening
the way of the family of God to one and all.

Luke 2: 1; 3–7

No room for the Lord of life, Prince of peace.
Space shared with animals kept for sustenance;
the sacrifices of existence and forgiveness.
Born into poverty; the struggle for survival
that this child will one day redeem.

Luke 2: 8–16

Angelic announcement of peace and goodwill
come in the form of the child found
by night workers, swaddled and lying in a manger.
His mother ponders these things -
annunciation, nativity, incarnation - in her heart.

Matthew 2: 1–12

Star following Magi look for the Prince of Peace
in the heart of power and opulence
only to find him in obscurity and humility.
Gifts given prefigure his divinity and sacrifice, the servant King
who, in birth and death, gives his life for others.

John 1: 1–14

Creative word now created, enfleshed, incarnated.
Divine life flowing in and through this child.
Light in darkness, revealing our passion
for power, position and personal gain.
In poverty, a counterpoint is born - compassion.

Giles Fraser, in the wake of the death of Girard and the Paris attacks, recently summarised Girard's thinking:

'The anthropologist René Girard died earlier this month, at home in California. A Frenchman, he did not live to see the latest violence in his home country. But, in a sense, he had been working on it his entire professional life. For no modern thinker has done more to understand the self-repeating patterns through which violence flows. And there can be no more disturbing conclusion than his, especially now: that violence is a form of copying, that violence is contagious, and that, as he put it: “Violence is like a raging fire that feeds on the very objects intended to smother its flames.”'

'Girard’s answer to mimetic violence is that we must break the cycle by refusing to mirror our enemies. Indeed, his rejection of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth is not hand-wringing pacifism – it is bloody-minded, hard-nosed defiance; a refusal to be defined by the violent other, a refusal to answer back in kind.'

'Girard goes on to argue that the most vociferous critic of religion turns out to be a Jewish prophet called Jesus of Nazareth. Girard understands the ministry of Jesus to be that of deliberately standing in the place of the innocent victim thus to reveal the profound wickedness of the whole scapegoat mechanism. And as he is strung up to die, the violence of religion is exposed in all its gruesome destructiveness. Forget Dawkins or Harris – according to Girard the greatest critic of religion was Jesus himself.'

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Low - If You Were Born Today.

A Girardian medition on the Nine Lessons

Freshly written and, therefore, too late for this year's Carol Services, here is a poetic meditation which draws on the thinking of René Girard in interpreting the Bible readings traditionally used in services of Nine Lessons and Carols:

Nine Lessons

Genesis 3: 8–19

Hard labour in birth and work, sweat on our brow,
dirt on our hands. Thorns and thistles to prick and sting,
like death from a serpent's tongue,
till we return to the ground,
ashes to dust and dust to ashes.

Genesis 22: 15–18

A sense of sacrifice required;
the death of children appeasing the divine.
An alternative is found - ram caught in thicket,
wool held by thorns. Animals become
the scapegoats for our sins.

Isaiah 9: 2; 6–7

Light in darkness promised
through the hard labour of the birth of a child.
A child bearing peace and goodwill,
bringing justice and righteousness
without end and without measure.

Isaiah 11: 1–3a; 4a; 6–9

A little child leading us to reconciliation.
From nature red in tooth and claw -
survival of the fittest - to peaceful co-existence.
Carnivores to herbivores, the drawing of the sting
from the serpent's tongue.

Luke 1: 26–35; 38

Highly favoured as the Spirit overshadows.
A virgin birth - subverting patriarchy -
of a son who will not marry or have blood offspring.
The saying of 'yes' to God opening
the way of the family of God to one and all.

Luke 2: 1; 3–7

No room for the Lord of life, Prince of peace.
Space shared with animals kept for sustenance;
the sacrifices of existence and forgiveness.
Born into poverty; the struggle for survival
that this child will one day redeem.

Luke 2: 8–16

Angelic announcement of peace and goodwill
come in the form of the child found
by night workers, swaddled and lying in a manger.
His mother ponders these things -
annunciation, nativity, incarnation - in her heart.

Matthew 2: 1–12

Star following Magi look for the Prince of Peace
in the heart of power and opulence
only to find him in obscurity and humility.
Gifts given prefigure his divinity and sacrifice, the servant King
who, in birth and death, gives his life for others.

John 1: 1–14

Creative word now created, enfleshed, incarnated.
Divine life flowing in and through this child.
Light in darkness, revealing our passion
for power, position and personal gain.
In poverty, a counterpoint is born - compassion.

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Boris Ord - Adam Lay Ybounden.

Christ overlooked at Christmas

This was the homily that I gave at the Service of Nine Lessons and Carols by Candlelight which we held at St John's Seven Kings last Sunday evening:

It may sound an odd thing to say at a service attended by a large number of people, but Jesus has always been overlooked at Christmas. Think about the Christmas story for a moment; Jesus spent his first night sleeping in an animal’s feeding trough because there was no room for him in the guest room of the home in Bethlehem where his family were staying, the Shepherds needed a fanfare of angels before they knew of his birth, while the Wise Men looked for him in a palace when he was actually to be found in an ordinary home. So it is no surprise that today many people still overlook the person at the heart of Christmas in the busyness of life and Christmas preparations and others overlook him by creating supposedly PC festivals like Winterval.

Jesus has always been overlooked at Christmas but one of the reasons for that is that he came to be one of us, God with us, which is what the name Emmanuel means. Born in an obscure village, working in a carpenter’s shop, never writing a book, never holding an office, never having a family or owning a house, never going to college, never travelling two hundred miles from the place where he was born. He did none of the things we usually associate with greatness. He is God become an ordinary person just like us. And therefore he is easy to overlook.

But just as the Shepherds and Wise Men did seek him out and find him, those who genuinely look for Jesus this Christmas will find him. And if you are prepared to seek him out, you will find that Jesus is the greatest gift that any of us can receive, both at Christmas and any other time in our lives.

As you listen to the story of Jesus’ birth tonight, the story will have meaning as you take it to heart. The 17th century German mystic, Angelus Silesius, warns us:

Though Christ a thousand times
In Bethlehem be born
If he’s not born in thee,
Thou art still forlorn.

If Christ is not born in you as you listen and sing, this time together will be pleasant but not life changing. But if Christ is born in you then the whole story will be transformed. It will become your story. You will be able to say:

Christ born in a stable
is born in me.
Christ accepted by shepherds
accepts me.
Christ receiving the wise men
receives me.
Christ revealed to the nations
be revealed in me.
Christ dwelling in Nazareth
You dwell in me.

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Steve Bell - Magnificat.

Seven Good Joys

Knitted nativity at Parkview Court

 

Nine Lessons and Carols by Candlelight below

This week at St John's Seven Kings we have: sung carols at Parkview Court and along Devonshire Road; hosted a Christmas performance by Aldborough E-Act Free School; held a Christmas Assembly for Downshall Primary School; had a Youth Group Christmas Party; and, tonight, held our Nine Lessons and Carols by Candlelight. Here is the cribbed homily I gave during the latter service:

‘The Seven Joys of Mary’ or 'Seven Good Joys' is a traditional carol about Mary's happiness at moments in the life of Jesus, probably inspired by the Seven Joys of the Virgin in the devotional literature and art of Medieval Europe. I’ve come across this carol only recently, as it is included on Kate Rusby’s excellent Christmas album While Mortals Sleep.

The carol has a simple, repetitive but beautiful structure:

“The first good joy that Mary had,
It was the joy of one
To see her blessed Jesus
When He was first her Son.
When He was first her Son, Good Lord;
And happy may we be,
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost
To all eternity”

That structure is repeated for all seven joys. There are different British and US versions of the carol which taken together give more that seven joys but the basic joys of Mary of which the carol speaks are to see her own Son Jesus: suck at her breast bone; make the lame to go; make the blind to see; read the Bible o'er; bring the dead alive; upon the crucifix; and wear the crown of heaven.

These seven joys take us from the nativity of Christ (suck at her breast bone) through his ministry (make the lame to go; make the blind to see; read the Bible o'er; bring the dead alive) to his death (upon the crucifix), and on to his resurrection and ascension (wear the crown of heaven).

Part of the reason this carol resonates, besides its beauty, is that it links Christmas with Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. It even dares to list the Crucifixion as one of Mary’s joys, an incomprehensible idea unless viewed with the eyes of faith.

So the singing of a carol like this can help us more fully explain the meaning of Christmas and save it from mere sentimentality because, as the carol describes, Christ is born into our world to save us by his life, death, and resurrection. This is the ultimate lesson of every true Christmas tradition and the source of all our joys as Christians, as well as those of Mary.

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Kate Rusby - Joy To The World.

St John's Christmas Leaflet

Does Christmas start with telly ads in October?
Does Christmas start with the office party?
Does Christmas start with a fight on Eastenders?

No! Christmas starts with Christ.

The Christmas story has been around for a long time, but today it's being forgotten. Just 12 per cent of adults know the nativity story, and more than one-third of children don’t know whose birthday it is. Meanwhile, 51 per cent of people now say the birth of Jesus is irrelevant to their Christmas.

Together we can reverse the trend. Some of the UK’s leading Christian groups, including the Church of England, the Evangelical Alliance and Bible Society, are coming together because they believe Christmas is worth saving. Christmas Starts with Christ is a campaign aimed at helping churches to make Christ and the amazing story of his birth the focus of the nation’s favourite time of year.

The campaign kicks off on December 1st this year with the first-ever nationwide Christmas Starts Sunday, at the beginning of Advent.  The campaign features posters in festive green and red which focus strongly on the message they want to get across, that Christmas starts with Christ.  There are three posters. They ask people to think about when Christmas starts. Is it with the traditional fight on Eastenders? Is it when Christmas ads appear in October? Or is it at the office party? There is also a radio ad and three extra posters, using the same design, which churches can customise for free.

Francis Goodwin of ChurchAds.net, which is coordinating this campaign, says: ‘Christmas is a time when Christians shine light in their communities. But the good news is being lost. We can’t sit back and let that happen. We’re passionate about bringing the church together to remind everyone of the true meaning of Christmas.’

Steve Clifford, General Director of the Evangelical Alliance says, “I’m excited by this campaign, which really seeks to show that the Church is good news for the nation in every season; not least of all at Christmas when we celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, our saviour. The world needs to know that’s why we do what we do.”

Arun Arora, Director of Communications, Church of England says, “Churches do a huge amount to carry the Christmas story into their local communities, through word and deed. Christmas Starts With Christ uses a common logo to ‘join the dots’ of these activities and project a powerful message to our nation that the reason for the season is the birth of Jesus.”

This Christmas let us project that same powerful message as we invite others to church and send Christmas greetings by post, email or social media. The reason for the season is Jesus – Christmas starts with Christ!

Advent & Christmas at St John's Seven Kings -
November/December 2013

 

November  

Saturday 30^th   10.30am          Christmas Bazaar – Refreshments, handicrafts, cakes, raffles, preserves, toiletries, games & toys for children, Christmas gifts and many other stalls. Visit Santa in his grotto.

December  

 

Sunday 1^st         

10.00am        Advent Reflections Service - poems,  readings and songs

 6.30pm         Advent Service - Seven Kings Fellowship of Churches

Saturday 7^th       6.00pm          Tamil Carol Service

Sunday 15^th    

10.00am          All-age Christingle Service - a colourful service of music & light (collection for The Children’s Society)

6.30pm          Service of Nine Lessons and Carols at St Peter’s Aldborough Hatch - traditional carols and readings

Tuesday 17^th     7.00pm          Carol Singing around the Parish - wrap up warm. Collecting for Haven

House Hospice.

Sunday 22^nd      6.30pm          Service of Nine Lessons and Carols by candlelight  - traditional carols and readings

Christmas Eve (Tuesday 24^th)

5.00pm        All-age Nativity Service - dressing up & tree lighting - fun for all. Bring a present to

leave under the tree for children helped by Barnados. Collection to Haven House Hospice.

11.30pm     First Holy Communion of Christmas

Christmas Day (Wednesday 25^th)

 

8.00am         Holy Communion - Book of Common Prayer

10.00am       Christmas All-age Holy Communion - children, bring a gift you have received to show others

New Years Eve (Tuesday 31^st)

11.30pm       Watchnight Service - welcoming the New Year in prayer and reflection

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Red Mountain Music - Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus. 

Christmas: the centrality of the unregarded

This is my homily from last night's Service of Nine Lessons and Carols by Candlelight at St John's Seven Kings. It is a mash up of One Solitary Life and two of my meditations - Unregarded and Jesus is condemned to death. It ends with Malcolm Guite's sonnet Christmas on the edge which can be found in Sounding the Seasons:

Tonight we retell the story of a man who was born in an obscure village, the child of a peasant woman. He grew up in a town from which no good was known to come. He worked in a carpenter’s shop until He was thirty. Then for three years He was an itinerant preacher.

He never owned a home. He never wrote a book. He never held an office. He never had a family. He never went to college. He never put His foot inside a big city. He never travelled two hundred miles from the place He was born. He never did one of the things that usually accompany greatness. He had no credentials but Himself ...

In appearance he was reckoned to be without beauty or majesty, undesired. In his life, he was despised and rejected, unrecognised and unesteemed, as, while still a young man, the tide of popular opinion turned against him. His friends ran away. One of them denied him. He was turned over to his enemies. He went through the mockery of a trial. He was nailed upon a cross between two thieves. While He was dying his executioners gambled for the only piece of property he had on earth – his coat. When he was dead, he was laid in a borrowed grave through the pity of a friend.

Two entire Millennia have passed since he first was born in Bethlehem and yet all the armies that ever marched, all the navies that were ever built; all the parliaments that ever sat and all the kings that ever reigned, put together, have not affected the life of human beings upon this earth as powerfully as has that one solitary life.

Through his birth, life, death and resurrection all that we once thought marginal to human life has been shown to be essential: the way of compassion rather than the way of domination; the way of self-sacrifice rather than the way of self; the way of powerlessness rather than the way of power; the way of serving rather than the way of grasping.

Christmas sets the centre on the edge;
The edge of town, the outhouse of the inn,
The fringe of empire, far from privilege
And power, on the edge and outer spin
Of  turning worlds, a margin of small stars
That edge a galaxy itself light years
From some unguessed at cosmic origin.
Christmas sets the centre at the edge.

And from this day our world is re-aligned
A tiny seed unfolding in the womb
Becomes the source from which we all unfold
And flower into being. We are healed,                                                                                                  The end begins, the tomb becomes a womb,
For now in him all things are re-aligned.

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Evanescence - Lost In Paradise.

The non-possessive life of God

Have you bought your Christmas presents yet? Are you someone who buys throughout the year or someone who buys at the last minute? Have you also made your list of gifts you would like to receive? Christmas is a time for giving and receiving. As Lewis Hyde writes in his book entitled ‘The Gift’, “The spirit of a gift is kept alive by its constant donation”: “a cardinal property of the gift: whatever we have been given is supposed to be given away again, not kept. Or, if it is kept, something of similar value should move on in its stead … You may keep your Christmas present, but it ceases to be a gift in the true sense unless you have given something else away.”

The greatest gifts though are those where no return is expected by the giver. The shoebox presents prepared as part of Operation Christmas Child are like that. Gifts are chosen, placed in a shoebox which is wrapped and then sent to needy children in Africa and Eastern Europe. Operation Christmas Child gives those who grow up in relative wealth the opportunity to participate in selfless giving and show compassion to others - irrespective of creed, colour, religion, sex or ethnicity of either the giver or the receiver.

The man who pioneered mass production of motor vehicles, Henry Ford, said that the most successful person would be the one who would fill the greatest need the best. On this basis Jesus Christ remains the greatest person who ever lived because He made the greatest sacrifice to fill the greatest need for the greatest number of people. The sheer thought that God would send His Son to die for mankind, is amazing: “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life” (John 3:16). 

 

David Runcorn writes that “the life of God is non-possessive, non-competitive, humbly attentive to the interests of the other, united in love and vision.” It is this that we see at Christmas as we celebrate the arrival of the greatest gift of all and it is also what we see at Easter as God’s greatest gift gives his own life for the sake of us all. Christmas is a time for giving and receiving gifts. May we, this Christmas, receive the greatest gift of all.

Here are the service/activities at St John's Seven Kings for Advent and Christmas:

 

December 2012

• Saturday 1^st Dec, 6.00pm, Tamil Carol Service
• Sunday 2^nd Dec, 10.00am, Advent Reflections Service - poems, readings and songs
• Sunday 2^nd Dec, 6.30pm, Advent Service at St Peter’s Aldborough Hatch - Seven Kings Fellowship of Churches
• Sunday 16^th Dec, 10.00am, All-age Christingle Service - a colourful service of music & light (collection for The Children’s Society)
• Sunday 16^th Dec, 6.30pm, Service of Nine Lessons and Carols by Candlelight - traditional carols and readings
• Tuesday 18^th Dec, 7.00pm, Carol singing around the Parish - wrap up warm. Collecting for Haven House Hospice
• Sunday 23^rd Dec, 6.30pm, Service of Nine Lessons and Carols at St Peter’s Aldborough Hatch
• Monday 24^th Dec (Christmas Eve), 5.00pm, All-age Nativity Service - dressing up & tree lighting - fun for all. Bring a present to leave under the tree for children helped by Barnados. Collection to Haven House Hospice.
• Monday 24^th Dec (Christmas Eve), 11.30pm, First Holy Communion of Christmas
• Tuesday 25^th Dec (Christmas Day), 8.00am, Holy Communion - Book of Common Prayer
• Tuesday 25^th Dec (Christmas Day), 10.00am, Christmas All-age Holy Communion - children, bring a gift you have received to show others
• Monday 31^st Dec (New Years Eve), 11.30pm, Watchnight Service - welcoming the New Year in prayer and reflection

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Bruce Cockburn - Cry Of A Tiny Baby.

Christmas at St John's (1)

We had our All-Age Christingle Service and Service of Nine Lessons and Carols by candlelight today at St John's Seven Kings. Also above are photographs from our Youth Group's Christmas Party and our Christmas Bazaar plus our Christmas Tree. During the week we have had both the Aldborough E-Act Free School and Downshall Primary School in church for Christmas shows and assemblies. New opportunities this year have included the link with the Free School and a Carol Service held at a local supported housing complex, which has led on to a monthly service also being requested. Tomorrow will find us carol singing in the parish, while on Tuesday we have our Carol Tea.

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Solomon Burke - Silent Night.

Photographs: St Peter's and OPEN

Today I've been at St Peter's Aldborough Hatch for their morning service (see sermon) and have been back this evening for their Service of Nine Lessons and Carols with the joint choirs of St John's and St Peter's. In between I've also been to the fourth session of OPEN.

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This Picture - The Great Tree.

Favourite music for worship meme

I haven't been tagged for this meme (yet!) but found it via Banksboy as part of an interesting reflection by Kathryn Rose on the CCM praise songs we have trouble with meme, so thought I would try it anyway. Kathryn's questions are:  

1. What is your favourite piece of music for congregational singing? Why?
2. What is your favourite piece of music for performance by a group of specialist musicians within a liturgical context? This might be a worship band or a cathedral choir or just a very snazzy organist or something else entirely, but the point is that it is not congregational singing and it is live music in liturgy.
3. What is your favourite piece of music which makes you think about God to listen to outside of your place of worship? Why? This could be secular music.
4. What is one thing you like about the music at your usual place of worship? Have you told the musicians about this lately?

1. Currently this would John Bell and Graham Maule’s deeply satisfying hymn ‘Will You Come and Follow Me?’ which sets challenging, thought-provoking lyrics to a well known, upbeat, and very singable traditional tune. John Vincent says that the hymn gives us hints of what discipleship can mean by taking its cues from the following of the first disciples and goes on to make the following points about the song's content:

• "Unpredictable journey. ‘Will you go where you don’t know and never be the same?’ Jesus is on a journey. Disciples go with him. Where Jesus goes depends on his sense of mission. When everyone wants him to stay, he says, ‘Let’s go somewhere else.’ It’s unpredictable. So discipleship is uncertain, open-ended.
• Unpredictable company. ‘Will you let my love be shown, will you let my name be known?’ Jesus is a people person; out on the streets. Disciples have to make friends with those he makes friends with – publicans, outcasts, lepers, people outside legal society.
• Alternative community. ‘Will you risk the hostile stare should your life attract or scare?’ Jesus is excluded from Church: his synagogue does not want him. Jesus creates a new Community, unrecognised and ridiculed by most people.
• Pouring out. ‘Will you let the blinded see … will you set the prisoners free?’ Jesus transforms homes into sanctuaries, sows’ ears into satin purses, and victims into partners, as he ‘pours himself’ out to others.
• Political ministry. ‘Will you use the faith you’ve found to reshape the world around?’ Jesus opposes enemies of the common people. Jesus pioneers and practises an alternative society which begins to change everything around it."

2.  'Freedom Samba' by the Late, Late Service from God in the Flesh. The Late, Late Service was an experimental Christian Community based in Glasgow which began in the 1990s using a mix of ambient, electronic and world music styles in their worship. 'Freedom Samba' is an exceptionally joyful dance track; lyrics and music move symbiotically to its samba rhythms while remaining eminently singable by a congregation through its call and response structure.

3. 'Credo' by Arvo Pärt. This is music which takes the listener on an emotional faith journey beginning with a confident fanfare of belief but then descending into the dissonant chaos of doubt before emerging into a more hestitant state of trust which opens out into contemplative silence. This is music to pray along with as you inhabit the emotional states conjured by this composition.

4. I like those occasions, such as Nine Lessons and Carols, when our choir joins with neighbouring choirs to lead our worship. This is because: doing so cements relationships across parish boundaries; a wider and more demanding programme of pieces is made possible; and they rise to the challenge with passages of real beauty. I do compliment them on their selections and performances after such services.

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Arvo Pärt - Credo (2/2).