December is finally here! For most people in mainstream British culture (and certainly for me growing up) this is where Advent starts to feel like a thing. Advent Calendar windows will have opened all over the country today (including two in our house*) and perhaps you’re thinking how to make the best of the season for yourself. Today I thought I’d have a countdown of my own with my top five suggestions for how you can make the most of Advent.**
5. Try to hold off on Christmas!
Saving Christmas for, well, Christmas, not only heightens your anticipation and enjoyment when the 25th comes around, it also makes space for Advent to be its own thing. Nonetheless, realistically sometimes work or church things make a bit of pre-Christmas celebrating unavoidable.
So don’t be legalistic about it, but without giving yourself unnecessary burdens on your conscience, try to find something that really says ‘Christmas’ for you and hold off on it until Christmas is here. For me, it’s the food – no mince pie tastes better than the one I eat when I get home from the midnight service that kicks off Christmas.
4. Make an Advent playlist on iPlayer/Spotify/YouTube etc
I didn’t know this until I started looking for ways to celebrate the church calendar for myself, but there’s a whole genre of ‘Advent carols’ which are totally different from Christmas carols (though some of them end up on Christmas CDs). I find music really helps set the mood for each season (what I suppose in my head I call the Spiritual thermostat), so why not make yourself a playlist of some of your favourite hymns/songs that look forward to Jesus’ return? Some of my favourites (other recordings are available) are:
Traditional
- O Come, O Come Emmanuel
- Come thou long expected Jesus
- Lo he comes with clouds descending
- O Come divine Messiah
More Modern
3. Read Scripture that focuses on Jesus’ return
During Advent the Bible reading plan I use is in Isaiah and Revelation in December. We probably think of Isaiah as the place for classic Christmas readings – but it also tells us loads about what Jesus’ kingdom and the New Creation will be like. Likewise Revelation is full of the hope of Jesus’ return and the right way to respond to that. In the past I’ve also spent time reflecting on Jesus’ parables in Matthew 25.
2. Pray for Jesus to come back
We could probably all do this more often but why not try to pray for Jesus to return every day in Advent? Use the things you’re learning/singing about to help you think through why you want him to come back. If you say the Lord’s Prayer regularly, slip it into ‘your Kingdom come’. My wife and I like to finish evening prayer together with one of us saying ‘The Spirit and the Bride say “Come!”‘ and the other replying ‘Amen, Come Lord Jesus!’
1. Reflect – Rejoice – Repent
Repentance is always in season, but as we’ve seen, it’s particularly strongly associated with Advent. Advent reminds us repentance isn’t gloomy, it can be really hopeful as we cast away the works of darkness because the day is nearly here and salvation is closer than when we first believed (Rom 13:11-13) When Jesus comes back we will be like him – and everyone who hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure. I try (and fail) every year to keep a journal in advent as a way of trying to think about how advent hope should be changing me. Why not give a bit more time to reflection once or twice a week to think of a few things you’re taking away from a focus on Jesus’ return, some things you are looking forward to about it, and some areas you should repent in the light of that hope?
*to be precise, one of them actually calls itself a ‘chocolate countdown calendar’. You might think this is an example of secularisation, but I like to think that it’s evidence that the people behind Tony’s Chocolonely are liturgical purists.
** thanks to a previous home group for being the catalyst for me coming up with these – in many ways, you’re where Christ and Calendar started. You might find this post quite familiar.
Christ and Calendar 