A Pre-Advent MEssage:

People look east the time is near of the crowning of the year.
Make your hearth fair as you are able, trim the hearth and set the table.
People look east and sing today: Love the guest is on the way.
( verse 1 of #9 in Voices United words ©1928 Eleanor Farjeon. Used with permission under License #C6531 LicenSing—Copyright Cleared Music for Churches)

“…the time is near of the crowning of the year”. Can that really be right? As I sit down to write this the wind is, literally, howling outside. Soon we will be scraping frost from our windows and snow from our walks. These are signs that the crowning of the year is coming? That can’t be right.

But what if it is? What if the crowning, or at least one of the crownings, of the year really is coming? That would be a cause for hope. That would be a cause for celebration.

In fact it is true. The coming of mid-winter, with its darkness and cold, also brings us reminders of the Light of the World, the Light that can never be blown out. We face the forces of hopelessness in our world, whatever they are, with the story of a baby’s birth. The crowning of the year is the news that we sing “Joy to the World! The Lord is Come!”

Angels announce with shouts of mirth Christ who brings new life to earth
Set every peak and valley humming with the word the Lord is coming.
People look east and sing today: Love the Lord is on the way.
(verse 5 of #9 in Voices United words ©1928 Eleanor Farjeon. Used with permission under License #C6531 LicenSing—Copyright Cleared Music for Churches)

Soon we will once again tell the story and sing the songs about the birth of a baby. But more than an infant boy in long ago Bethlehem we sing about the hope that is reborn in our hearts. Indeed the time is near of the crowning of the year. Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel, God-With-Us, is coming into our lives. Alleluia!