St Peters Church,
Boyatt Wood,
Eastleigh

Dear Friends,

The nights are drawing rapidly in and it will not be long now until the shortest day of the year (21st Dec) and Christmas will be over. First though we will enter the season of “Advent”.

Derived from the Latin word, Adventus, which means “coming” or
“arrival”, it signals a time of “expectant waiting”. It also marks the beginning of the new church year on Advent Sunday (27th Nov.). But as we approach Advent, I wonder what it is that each of us may be waiting for?

In the 5th century Advent began on St Martin’s Day (11th Nov.) and took the form of six weeks fasting leading up to Christmas. During the 6th century Advent was dropped to its current length and later the fasting was dropped altogether.

Nowadays Advent has a two-fold meaning for Christians. It is the time when we remember that Jesus was born more than 2000 years ago in Palestine and we look forward to celebrating that birth again at Christmas,usually as a family occasion with feasting and presents.

The second part of Advent is the one that we conveniently seem to forget and the Bible tells us that Jesus will return one day as “Christ the King” in all his glory.

In this double focus on past and future, Advent also symbolizes the spiritual journey of individuals and of congregations. We boldly state that Christ has come, that He is present in the world today, and that He will come again in power.

But this offers us all a great challenge on how we live our lives as followers of Jesus in this “time of waiting”. We are called to be faithful stewards of all that has been trusted to us as followers of Jesus and hence the people of God. This calls for “Holy living” and a displaying of lives lived according to the ethics of God’s Kingdom. What are you waiting for this Advent season?

One of the things that we have been trying to do through November is to explore the notion of ”St. Peter’s at Prayer “. We have been meeting on Tuesday evenings on the basis that if we are truly followers of God through Jesus, then we ought to offer the life and work of our church, in this community of Boyatt Wood, back to God and seek His guidance for all that we do here.

And our expectancy of course is that God will guide us!

This means that everything we are and do is offered to God, especially those things we tend to struggle for, like appointing members of the PCC and in positions of leadership, understanding of our gifting, and our outreach to the community.

If Jesus was to return tomorrow I wonder what any of us would say to him?
More importantly, what would he say to us?
Would it be: ‘Well-done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness (Matt 25:23)

Advent is a time when we embark on our own spiritual “MOT”. Are we as individuals and as a church ready to meet the challenge as we wait “between the times”? God will guide us! If we are prepared to listen of course!!

O Come, O Come, Emmanuel