My first wedding and Advent fun

I performed my first wedding today- it was small and simple in our chapel at church, and the couple was very giggly, which I thought was funny.  There I was, in my white robe, trying to give them their vows, and they were just looking at each other and giggling.  Oh well, I'm glad they were having fun.  I know I had fun!

The funeral last week was a long and tiring experience, but I was very honored to be a part of it.  I basically planned the funeral and did most of it, and the head pastor preached the sermon.  There were a lot of people there, and a lot of them followed us out to the grave site as well, which was 45 minutes away!  I know that we tried to make the service as meaningful as we could and make it more of a celebration of her life.  I know she will be missed by everyone at church in particular.

This has been a busy week already.  I'm preparing my sermon for Sunday, as well as planning some Advent things.  For example, this year I suggested that Memorial have a progressive nativity scene during Advent.  So each week we will add a new piece and talk about why it's being added.  We are also tying these pieces into the 4 Advent candles. I spent the afternoon writing a liturgy to go along with the candles, and I chose 4 names for them: Mary and Joseph, Wise Men, Shepherd, and Lamb candle.  I know it's not the traditional hope, joy, peace, and love that we all know, but I decided to make it a little more creative.  We'll see how it goes. As for the casual service, I hope to have something new and creative each week of Advent.  I have some good resources I'll be working with, and the praise band will hopefully be doing some new Christmas songs.

For my sermon this week, I'm going to talk about making Advent meaningful again, (even a world-changing event again) instead of making it a time to run around like crazy and worrying about shopping lists and traffic jams, etc.  This has roots in something called Advent Conspiracy:  http://www.adventconspiracy.org/

You can see for yourself what it's about, but it just really struck me when I heard about it.  Corey just sent me an article entitled, "Evangelicals Adopting Advent," and my first thought was, What?  They (some) don't celebrate Advent?  How in the world do they prepare for Christmas day?  Maybe I read it wrong, but I cannot imagine a church that does not prepare mentally, physically, spiritually for the celebration of Christ coming to this earth.  The article claims that Advent is too "traditional," too "old school," you get the idea.  If we don't prepare ourselves spiritually and prayerfully as Christians during this time of year, we will totally miss the point among the craziness and commercialism that Christmas has become.  Sometimes we "traditionalists" do know what we're talking about, believe it or not...good for them for "adopting Advent."

Well, there's my two cents...for what it's worth!