First Sunday of Advent

Here are some notes on our worship service for the first Sunday of Advent. 

Today, with the first Sunday of Advent, we begin a New Year in the church. Unlike the secular calendar, the Christian calendar begins today as we anticipate the birthing of the Christ child. In these four weeks building up to Christmas we are called into reflection, waiting, and anticipation.

The theme of our Advent season this year at UCC is “Anticipating” and with each week given a traditional identity we will, accordingly, be Anticipating Hope, Anticipating Peace, Anticipating Joy and Anticipating Love. Each week we will light the candles of the Advent wreath culminating on Christmas Eve in the lighting of the Christ Candle.

We begin our service today with something different for us… Though very common in many Christian traditions, the singing of the Kyrie Eleison is something we rarely do. An ancient practice, we enter into these sung Greek words which mean “Lord have mercy” followed by “Christe Eleison” (“Christ have mercy”) and concluding with Kyrie Eleison. In today’s use we are playing a Kyrie from the Wild Goose Worship Group from Glasgow, Scotland which have the following prayers spoken between the 3 singings of the Kyrie.

God of all time
Forgive us our false busy-ness
The busy-ness we manufacture to make us seem important
The busy-ness we invent to keep us from ourselves
The busy-ness in which we hide because we fear to stand still…
…To be alone…
…Or even to meet you…

(Kyrie eleison)

God of all hope
Forgive us our hopelessness
Our bondage to an imagined, glorious past
Our cynicism regarding the good in others
Our weird talent for spotting the problem before the potential

(Kyrie eleison)

God of all love
Forgive our grudged compassion
Our unquestioning affection for what seems safe
And all our lusts especially those we pretend are heartfelt longings

(Kyrie eleison)

God of all time, hope, and love
Recreate us until we live looking more to Christ than to the clock
Walk by the light without being obsessed with the darkness
And in all our loving, seek to credit and never shame the one in whose name we pray.
Amen.