Message From the Pastor - The Road to Emmanuel

As you enter the sanctuary, look around and notice the blues. The paraments, the four candles in a wreath, and the star artwork across the chancel. Blue is the color of Advent: it’s the color of dawn, just before light breaks in; it’s the color of hope that we can’t quite see. 

This Advent we’ll travel The Road to Emmanuel. Isaiah and Matthew will be our traveling companions—Isaiah with his big, aching hope for a world made new, and Matthew with his steady reminders to stay awake to what God is doing in our midst. 

Isaiah envisions a world made new: 

• Swords hammered into plowshares (Isaiah 2) 

• A shoot coming out of an old stump (Isaiah 11) 

• Deserts bursting into bloom (Isaiah 35) 

• A young woman bearing a child—Emmanuel—God with us (Isaiah 7)

Matthew, in contrast, asks, “Are you awake enough to notice what God is doing right now?” 

Advent is counter-cultural. It comes when the pace of life accelerates, when our calendars fill, when the world shouts: do more, buy more, stuff will make you happy. Into that speeding highway, Advent whispers something simpler: slow down, make a little space for hope. 

This blue season nudges us to ask: What needs to be cleared out? Where might God be making room for something new to grow? 

Wendy Wright, in her book, The Vigil, writes that belief isn’t about agreeing with ideas. It’s about letting something sink “into the marrow of your bones and form the structure of your life.” This is the promise of Advent—letting Emmanuel reshape us from the inside out. 

And for many, this season isn’t always joyous. Grief, exhaustion, loneliness, change, and even the pressure of the holidays can feel heavy. Our Longest Night Service on December 21 offers a place to breathe, to pray, and to rest in God’s presence. 

As we travel the Road to Emmanuel together, my hope is that we’ll find a bit more room for wonder—and a deeper awareness that God is drawing near our actual lives. 

Come, Emmanuel. 

Come, make a home in us. 

Donna