The wait is almost over

A time of waiting – Looking forward to the fulfilment of a promise

As we move towards the celebration of Advent, we have been considering the subject of waiting in our assemblies. In this busy and modern day world, this is probablysomething we either don’t need to do anymore or struggle with. I noticed the other day my frustration when my email system decided to go slow, it took ten seconds to load, yet 15 years ago I would have waited ten minutes for the tape drive on my PC to load a single file and I thought that was amazing. Time moves on and our expectations seem to increase.

For Israel and the Jews the waiting game was something that they had coped with for hundreds of years. God had promised a saviour, but it seemed as if they had been waiting for so long. Waiting does I believe make us appreciate something more. Saving up for buying my first LP record was a major event, I still have it and love to play it on my turntable. The last album I downloaded from ITunes doesn’t seem to have the same value. 

The season of Advent is about looking forward to the fulfilment of a promise, a promise that Israel waited for hundreds of years to be fulfilled. We are fortunate that we live on this side of the fulfilment and Advent is a reminder to us to focus on what the birth of Christ really meant for those who had waited, but also for us who have to wait no more. 

Over the next few weeks we will be focusing on different aspects of the Christmas story, considering the emotions, reactions and responses of those who were involved. There will be a number of different events taking place across these weeks from our Advent service to our Christmas Journey production, to our Christingle service and Christmas plays. Please join us whenever you can as we make the journey to Christmas as others did many years before. The sense of excitement is beginning to build in school and as always this will be a very special time in the school year.