|
Advent is quickly approaching and as You know there are many different advent traditions. As you may recall from last year, Advent is also a time of fasting that ends with feasting. There is rich history here, and there are some practices we can also adopt personally to enhance the season. There are various fasts, and some of the methods identified Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays as fasting days. Often there was still one proper meal allowed as well as liquid refreshments. So, you could choose to incorporate some form of fasting into this season. Here are some ideas:
1)Fast on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays by having only one meal with meat per day rather than three (breakfast and supper could be without meat.) Devote one hour each day to prayer.
2)Fast from commercialism (Christmas Shopping) on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays and devote one hour to prayer instead.
3)Fast from electronic time for one hour on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays and devote time to prayer instead.
Another final suggestion is to consider doing a Bethlehem Walk. This would be to log the distance that Joseph and Mary travelled to Bethlehem. This distance is 90 miles. Now, the Orthodox tradition celebrates Advent starting November 15 – January 6. If you started this challenge on November 15, that would equal 2.25 miles a day (3.6 km/day). You could do this as a family, and on the walk consider some prayer and discussion about Jesus and the hope he offers us (Deut. 6:7, 11:19). It is great to challenge ourselves out of our comfort zone. It is a great way to set aside extra time to dedicate all we do to the Lord and giving Him more of our time in gratitude.
I pray for all of those who are here and for those who are yet to be here. Praise God for His blessings, his mercy, and his grace.
Love In Christ,
Pastor Erich
|
