Eliot Presbyterian Church | Lowell, MA

Presbyterian Church in Lowell, MA

News

Why Advent?

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I love Christmas music. The day after Thanksgiving, I am ready to decorate a tree with lights and tinsel. I even love wrapping presents! But when it comes to worship, I need Advent. I need one place where the world isn’t buzzing, and instead it’s quiet. I need a place where people look less like perfect Christmas cards and more like Mary and Joseph searching for the inn. I need one place to confront life’s hard realities, like the wise men facing Herod or George Bailey facing suicide before the “everything’s-fine” ending of It’s a Wonderful Life. I need one place where “Hark the Herald Angels Sing” is not co-opted by department store speakers trying to convince me to buy one more thing. Instead, I need a place to pray for Christ to come to a world where there are still the hungry, the poor, and the broken, no matter how many Angel Tree gifts I delivered. I need a sanctuary in which to pray “Come, Thou Long-Expected Jesus,” because I need to acknowledge that we are not there yet, but the promise is to come. 

I know I am not the only one who needs this waiting time. Each Christmas, I do more pastoral care than any other time of year. It seems with everything that surrounds us (the lights, the presents, the cards, the movies, the songs) we get to thinking about the places in our lives which don’t match up with the glossy, sparkly, cheery whirlwind. People are nervous about connecting with families marked by addictions, mental illness, abuse, or long-standing hurt. Others go into debt with the expense of Christmas, while TV ads equate love and “being good” with receiving gifts, rather than love and being good being the gifts themselves. The days are short and the nights are long, and it seems to be the time of year when watching the news leaves us with more questions than answers.

Advent is the place to take those questions, not for easy answers but to experience the sure and quiet presence of God.

During Advent, we might think of our sanctuary like an inn that still has space for those who need it the most. During Advent, we welcome those who need somewhere to belong, those who need a place to pray in hope, those who need shelter from the chaos outside. After all, isn’t that most of us? Come to worship this Advent. Come to rest. Come to listen. Come to ponder, and I trust that you will find a Christmas that is more honest but also more hopeful, more generous, and more joyful. 

Celebrations

  • Christmas decorating, Saturday, Nov. 26, 10 a.m.
  • Christmas Eve worship, Saturday, Dec. 24, 7:30 p.m.
  • Christmas Day worship,  Sunday, Dec. 25, 10 a.m.

Tune into God’s rhythm

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You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second one is like it: you shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets. – Matthew 22:37-40

August has always seemed like a paradox to me. This month holds the hottest days of the year.
But right in the middle of those “dog days of summer,” school supplies start appearing in stores and we prepare to shift our schedules back into a more regular rhythm. Even if years have passed since you last studied in a classroom or hurried your own children to school each morning, the start of a new school year seems to mark a change of pace. I never feel quite ready for summer to end, though as a child I always looked forward to the start of a new school year. I loved shopping for school supplies and picking my outfit to wear on the first day of school. My mom always photographed my sister and me standing with our backpacks and lunch-boxes, ready for a new year of friends and learning.
This year, as children return to school and adults begin to feel the pace of life increase, I hope you will set love of God and neighbor as the drumbeat to which you march through the changing of the seasons. The fast-paced, self-centered rhythm of the world around us can be distracting and even overwhelming. One way that we tune into God’s rhythm is to engage in the life of the faith community and surround ourselves with others who seek to march to God’s drumbeat.

On Sept. 11, Eliot will throw a “Back-to-School Celebration” to help you and your family start the year off right. We will worship in South Common with a “blessing of the backpacks” for our children and youth. Leaders from the congregation will be sharing about opportunities for spiritual growth and service. There will be a potluck lunch, plenty of time for fellowship, and maybe even a pick-up soccer match. We are inviting our neighbors to join us, so you might even meet a new friend!

I hope you will come to the Back-to-School Celebration on Sept.11 to discover the many ways of being connected at Eliot Church and learn where God might be leading you in the year to come. Meet some of your neighbors in the pew and make a new friend or two. And go ahead, put on your best “first day of school” outfit. You might even find an excuse to buy a new Bible or a pack of multi-colored ink pens!