Dear Cliff Temple Family,

I was a child at home when I first heard the word Advent. Back then, it was associated with a little calendar boasting 24 colorful squares of perforated cardboard. Behind every square was a morsel of chocolate. Advent chocolate was richer and creamier than the little drops wrapped in foil residing in the cut-glass dish on the side table in my grandmother’s living room, and the daily ‘thripp’ of opening each piece of candy grew my anticipation as I waited out those seemingly endless days before Christmas. I’m glad I first heard about Advent at home.

In John’s gospel, when a couple of would-be apprentices of the Bible’s chief protagonist asked him where he was staying, all he said was “Come and see.” The word they use for stay is interchangeable with the words remain, dwell, and abide--good words to talk about at home.

I’m praying that the seasons of Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany will draw you home to the one who’s come to make his dwelling with us and through us. Advent hearkens back to the prophets who longed for the Anointed-Messiah to make everything right. It welcomes us into the Christmas present where our every move is an open invitation to come and see…and abide. In our abiding, our anticipation grows as we wait out these seemingly endless days before the end of days.

Two years after a Christmas Eve visit to Bethlehem in 1865, Phillips Brooks, Rector of Holy Trinity Church in Philadelphia, was inspired to write the poem “O Little Town of Bethlehem” for his Sunday school. The familiar tune we sing was added by church organist and composer Lewis Redner the night before its first performance by those children on Christmas Eve, 1867. Each week of this devotional begins with one of the verses to reflect on, including the fourth verse, one that disappeared from most standard hymnals and carol books.

Many thanks to our writers and to Joyce Wascom and team for compiling this beautiful work.

Like the openings in the calendar, every weekly activity and daily devotional offers a glimpse inside our congregation and with it an invitation to ‘thrrrip’ open the pages of our collective heart.

O come to us, abide with us, Our Lord Emmanuel.

Jesus Only,

Gannon Sims