Advent Words from Rusty

Do you remember any words of blessing your parents or family shared with you? Maybe the blessing was as simple, and profound, as a regular: “I love you.” Maybe it was a gesture—packing your lunch, a hug on the way out the door, a word or phrase regularly shared with a smile or a wink. Growing-up, my father was the morning chauffeur that drove me and my sister to school. As we approached the school and prepared to depart his company he would say an often repeated benediction from scripture: “The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine upon you” (Numbers 6:24-25). When I hear those words, I remember my father—the depth of his love for me.

This year for the Advent-Christmas season, the collaborative team of theologians and artists from A Sanctified Art imagined words that Mary might have offered to Jesus as he grew-up in her care. As they thought about the beginnings of Jesus’ life and what blessings Mary might have offered him, they turned to scriptures often read at other beginnings: weddings, baptisms, ordinations. Out of these scriptures, they developed a set of blessings that will guide us through this season.

The team at A Sanctified Art writes:

Advent is a season of endings and beginnings. As the calendar year comes to a close, a new church year begins. Christ’s birth ushers us into new ways of living and loving; and yet, the world as we know it spins madly on. In many ways, pregnant Mary was surrounded by endings—large and small, personal and political. But Mary proclaimed hope in a God who was and is making all things new. Christ’s birth offered a beautiful new beginning for shepherds and Magi alike—all the while, King Herod tried to bring Christ’s story to an end. When we ourselves navigate seasons filled with endings and beginnings, we need reminders. We need words that can feel like steady ground, like a path for our feet to find as we step forward into the unknown.

We have crafted an Advent series filled with blessings, with the words we need to hear again and again as we begin a new season… we invite you to enter this Advent season as if you are entering a sacred new chapter, holding fast to the reminders that will bolster you for the journey ahead. As you journey through this season, may you find words for belovedness and hope. May you find words for beginning again. For no matter what you are facing, no matter what this new day brings, love is your beginning.

May this season find us resting in the blessing of Christ’s hope, peace, joy, and love.

Journeying Together,
Rusty