“For I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.” Jeremiah 29:11
Dear friends,
Family traditions, church traditions, neighborhood traditions, holiday traditions, food traditions, cultural traditions. We all have them. We all love them. When someone suggests something new, many of us resist a change because “this is the thing we’ve always done and done this way.” None of us really welcomes change, even though we know in our hearts that change is living and to be alive is to change and grow with every breath we take.
It helps to remember that every practice, hymn, special dish, holiday ritual started out as a new idea at some point! Someone wrote a hymn text, tried a recipe, hung a stocking, knit an “ugly” sweater, wrote a letter about their year to share with friends they hadn’t seen in awhile, baked a pie, set a table, wrapped a special gift, scheduled a family zoom. And then these new traditions are adapted through time as families and congregations grow and move and shift to make things their own. What feels like “the way we’ve always done it” is in fact, constantly changing to welcome new babies, partners and friends. We adapt with joy to changing circumstances, and honor both the past and the present reality. We breathe new life into old traditions and we make room for new ones as our lives change.
A great example in the Church is the Advent wreath, which we will light on Sunday to mark the first Sunday of Advent. The Advent wreath is a relatively new thing, not arriving in the United States until the 1920’s, coming from the German Lutheran tradition. The history of the advent wreath dates back to 1830 in Germany when a Lutheran pastor, Johann H. Wichern, used a wagon wheel with candles to help the children he ministered to understand “how many more days until Christmas.” It was a whimsical teaching tool, and as with many ideas, we can assume Pastor Wichern had no idea that his “invention” would go on over many years to be adapted and interpreted by many denominations up through our day.
The Advent wreath we take for granted now would not have been even an idea to those folks who worshiped at Trinity when our Chapel was built. There would have been no Advent wreath in our historic Chapel for the first 40 or 50, maybe even 60 years of worship in this sacred space! I do not know when Trinity first adopted the practice, but it is heart-warming to see that at some point we welcomed a new thing, from a different tradition, which enhances our Advent observance each year.
The meaning of the candles has adapted through time as well. Today, we call them Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love.
As we begin this season of Advent together, may we give thanks for traditions that enlighten our hopes and help us to know Christ, the Light of our Salvation.
I look forward to seeing you on Sunday when we light the candle for Hope and reflect on the hope of Christ’s coming, past and future, and God’s promises of redemption.
Your sister in Christ,
Nancy+
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