Advent – Week 1 (11.26.23)

Our theme this year is “how does a weary world rejoice?”.

We’re borrowing that line from the Christmas carol, O Holy Night. It’s a line that holds tension and hope. Tension because both weariness and joy are present at the same time and hope because…well…weariness and joy are present at the same time.

This morning we consider the ways in which we doubt joy and even resist it. We explore the story of Zachariah and Elizabeth – a story of both weariness and joy — and let it inspire us to consider how we might more and more become people ready to receive joy when it sneaks “into the cracks of our imperfect life”.