Alexander Green

How Advent Can Be Much More Than “The Christmas Season”

Christmas ideas from Glenn Packiam:

For the longest time, I thought “Advent” was just a fancy word for “the Christmas season,” a holier, maybe more spiritual-sounding word for an otherwise hectic and overly-commercialized holiday stretch between Thanksgiving and December 25. What I’ve discovered in the past few years of observing Advent is that it’s not just a different word; it’s an entirely different approach.

Let me explain. Advent as a season is meant to make the journey toward Christmas full of meaning; it’s meant to put us touch with our deepest longings and greatest hopes; it’s meant to teach us to bring all our desires together on one object: Christ. While “Christmas” as a season (properly) begins on December 25 and goes twelve days (yes, there’s a song about that!) until January 6th, Advent is all about the build-up to it. It begins on the fourth Sunday before Christmas and takes us right up to the glorious celebration of the incarnation.

When you journey through Advent to Christmas, you begin to see Jesus more fully. You recognize that His incarnation was the beginning of the redemption of the world and that His return is the completion of it. Advent pulls those two moments together. It overlays the joy of His arrival as a helpless babe with the hope of His appearing as conquering King. Both arrivals are anticipated in celebrating Advent.

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5 Things Your Church Must Do at Christmas

Earlier this week, someone asked us to list five things that churches really need to do at Christmas. The Ministry Matters team brainstormed the question and came up with the following ideas based on our own experiences (read nightmares). Hopefully you’ll benefit by avoiding some of the mistakes we’ve already made.

1. Stick with the basics, but go deep. Tell the baby Jesus story, and use terms that a child or someone new to the faith can understand. But don’t shy from talking about Emmanuel and the incarnation. Get beyond the cute baby story and really deal with what Christmas means for Christians. The fact that God became a human to save humanity is mindblowing, but it takes creativity to help people see that truth in a fresh way each year. Unfortunately, in the church we often excel at making the extraordinary seem ordinary. If the Christmas story becomes old hat, that’s an indictment on us, not the story itself.

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Church to Auction 17th Century Hymn Book

A historic church in Massachusetts will be auctioning off one of their two hymn books that date from the 17th century.

Old South Church in Boston, a 300-plus year-old progressive congregation belonging to the United Church of Christ, voted Sunday to sell off one of their Bay Psalm Books, which were published in 1640.

The Board of Trustees for Old South will be auctioning off the Book and 19 colonial era silver items to help fund improvements to their present building as well as aid their nonprofit efforts.

Given that it is one of the first books to be published in North America, the Psalm Book is expected to bring in somewhere between $10 million and $20 million.

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Rob “No Hell” Bell Profiled in The New Yorker

Even before it was published, “Love Wins” caused a sensation. The word went out that a prominent megachurch leader had rejected Hell, thereby embracing heresy. The outcry helped make the book a best-seller, even though a number of Christian bookstores refused to stock it. The central message of “Love Wins” is that the church needs to stop scaring people away, and, in publishing the book, Bell hoped to spark a movement toward a more congenial, less punitive form of Christianity. He knew that some Christian leaders would object, but he didn’t foresee how much. His detractors stated their case on blogs, from pulpits, and, eventually, in books. “Love Wins” appeared in March, 2011, and by summer there were half a dozen rebuttals in print, including “God Wins,” by an editor at “Christianity Today,” and “Erasing Hell,” by Francis Chan, a fellow-pastor. John Piper, a prominent theologian and minister who expounds the value of “objective Biblical truth,” posted a terse message on Twitter: “Farewell Rob Bell.

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The Perfect Christmas Praise Set

As I’ve said before, the perfect praise set is like the perfect wedding: something old and something new.

A Christmas praise set is no different. With so many new Christmas praise songs being written these days, the “new” part is covered.

However, some contemporary churches think they’re too hip to sing traditional carols at Christmas. I’ll never forget visiting a famous megachurch one Christmas only to hear them open the service by performing the rock version of “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town” and then… not a single Christmas song in their praise set the Sunday before Christmas!

The worship leader should have been tarred and feathered. Your congregation wants (and actually expects) to hear Christmas music during the Christmas season. Who in their right mind would not expect to hear Christmas music… in a church… at Christmas! With the wealth of contemporary Christmas arrangements at our disposal these days I’m sure you can find an arrangement of “It Came Upon the Midnight Clear” that fits the style of your church.

As you plan your December praise sets you might want to choose a new Christmas worship song and do it every week during December so your congregation can become familiar with it. Introduce the new song first as a special, then invite the congregation to join in on a final chorus. Repeat for the next two weeks, skip the week before Christmas then sing the new song on Christmas Eve.

I recommend doing one Christmas song at the beginning of the season and surrounding it with your regular praise songs. For instance, have a typical 3-4 song praise set, then use a longer Christmas arrangement like my Bethel Worship-inspired version of O Come All Ye Faithful (Adore) for the offertory special right before the sermon. Add another song each week until the week before Christmas you do all Christmas music.

For a simple Christmas praise set format I’ll use my Light Has Come Set Starter as an example.

I start out with the upbeat, easy-to-learn new song “Our God Is Born” and transition directly into my upbeat version of O Come All Ye Faithful. This version starts strong and ends light, helping you flow into a Scripture reading and/or prayer. Then out of this quiet moment starts “Light Has Come (O Little Town)” – the new Christmas ballad that turns O Little Town of Bethlehem into a worship song.

There you have a quick and easy three song Christmas set template: two upbeat songs, a reading and a ballad.

Worship leaders tend to be run ragged at Christmas. Push a little harder this year and make sure every week in December has something extra special.

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