In his sermon last Sunday, our guest preacher, the Reverend Bob Miller, shared a wonderful quote from the contemporary American writer and theologian, Frederick Buechner (in his book Wishful Thinking): “To repent is to come to your senses. It is not so much something you do as something that happens. True repentance spends less time looking at the past and saying, “I’m sorry,” than to the future and saying, “Wow!”” It helps us put John the Baptist’s Advent cry to repent into a different perspective. This Sunday we will encounter Mary, the pregnant mother of Jesus, as she offers her own, “Wow” in the words of the Magnificat: “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord!” We repent when we say, “wow!” to God at work in our lives. Where are you experiencing what might be called “the wow of God” this Advent?
Connections and compassionate community will be the theme of our upcoming weekend February 5-7 with Natalie Finstad. Watch her TED talk here:
Save the date for this time of important conversations about how we create community that honors everyone as God’s beloved. This work is another form of repentance.
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