I was reviewing my blog from a year ago, and remembering how wonderful it was when you began to send me your pictures of your nativity scenes, with stories.
At the risk of repeating myself, I am happy to receive any pictures of your nativity scenes that you want to send me and I will post them here in the next 2 weeks for everyone to enjoy. I also have a special request for those of you that made the banners at last Friday’s wonderful “Olde Fashioned Christmas”. At the end of this I will post a few pictures that Dana took of the banners being made. We would love to see the finished products in your homes … with all the embellishments … and perhaps even you, in the picture! Please send them along for all to see.
My collection of nativity scenes, which I put on our mantle, comes from different parts of the world, and they are contextual to the culture. Below is one I found in a little artists’ shop in Washington, DC. I think it’s from Peru. It’s called Hammock Nativity. It is one of my favourites.
I was remembering that one year, as I took a picture of it to be included in the power point in the worship service, I realized that Jesus had been hanging upside down since the beginning of Advent. I was shocked that I hadn’t noticed it until then. I have shown him upside down, and then how he should be.
Poor Jesus … looking at the floor all that time instead of into the loving eyes of all who welcomed him into the world.
Feels like a fitting metaphor for Advent sometimes … our Stewardship coach at our last meeting in the week leading up to Advent 1 talked about “Madvent” … which we all related to. Yes, it is a blessed time.
But the reality for some of us is that we have often felt that we have been turned upside down, often focussed on only the view we can see. It takes intentionality to turn us right side up so we can see the miracles and love all around us.
This week we look at Mary’s visit from the angel Gabriel. As the poet Jan Richardson says, who wrote a poem from the angel Gabriel’s perspective (who was very much afraid of what he had to announce to Mary!) it was the marking of “… her last ordinary moment, knowing that the next step would cleave her life: that this day would slice her story in two, dividing all the days before from all the ones to come.”
In other words, turn her life upside down.
We are enjoying your pictures, which are very much helping me to stop and see the world around me in these “Madvent” days. Please keep them coming. This week’s words are:
Be
Yes
Courage
Magnify
Awaken
Vulnerability
Love
