Advent Sunday

Today is Advent Sunday. I had to explain to Robyn this week that Advent Sunday isn’t necessarily the day we open the 1st door on our Advent calendars. I expected her to be disappointed but instead she was excited about lighting the 1st Advent candle at church and began talking about counting down the Sundays until Christmas.

This afternoon we went to an Advent service at church. It was lovely. There were lots of candles lit and while people were waiting for the service to start you could hear them all talking about Christmas preparations. Someone behind me said she still had lots of shopping to do and somebody else was talking about their Christmas traditions. There was a real buzz about the place. Full of excitement and joy.

I got thinking about the floods appeal that has been launched. Our church was open all last week for people to bring blankets, clothes, towels etc which will be distributed to the people in Cumbria.

Here I was sitting in church excited about the start of Advent, full of anticipation about the exciting times that lay ahead of us in December with Katie’s 3rd birthday and of course Christmas and not far from us there are people whose lives have been devastated by floods. I told Robyn how I was feeling and she had tears in her eyes. She said “I might have some old toys that other children could have”. When we got home she went upstairs and brought some things down for me to take to church. Tomorrow I will look through all our clothes. Larger sized clothes are in particular need. I can help out there. There has to be some good points to being overweight!

So, as Advent begins let us watch and wait. Let us look forward and believe. But also let us remember and think about people who need our help, and never ever underestimate children.

Robyn has learned today that a lit candle is just as exciting as a piece of Advent calendar chocolate and will have helped some children get some toys back.