"A gift from our community of faith to you. Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary is devoted to preparing outstanding leaders for Christ’s church. One of the ways we nurture leaders is by building a loving community of faith and extending God’s grace to others. In this season of anticipation, we extend God’s grace to you and invite you to explore this book of Advent devotions. Through this collection, please join us as we prepare to receive God’s greatest gift—the birth of Jesus Christ."
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Advent Devotional for December 6
• 1 Corinthians 1:3-9
The word is: community is threatened, fellowship seems broken, and many have turned on one another. How do we talk to one another in the midst of painful division? The question of how we face this challenge seems timely during this season of penitence and expectation we call Advent. It is no small thing to bring authentic greetings, to begin a conversation in the midst of deep and painful divisions that rent a community asunder. What can we say? Where do we start? So much is at stake! Yet that is the weight Paul’s salutation was to bear and still bears as we tune our ears to the distant and present yearning for restored community. The tenor of this greeting sets the tone for the most important issue that needs to be addressed for dissension to cease. The issue was: they didn’t think they had a problem. They, in fact, thought they had it going on (as we used to say back home in the Bronx). With an ironic over-emphasis on how “they” have “in every way” and of “every kind” really got it made in the department of spiritual gifts, Paul will then immediately proceed to an exhortation about the terrible divisions among them. Which, of course, are the occasions giving rise to this epistle. The bold pivot of this carefully crafted greeting is the declaration, “God is faithful.” In the face of our unspoken and often unacknowledged failures to maintain fellowship: God is faithful. And these words beckon us as a fresh clarion call of hope. The community is divided, there are those who think they have already become spiritual giants and have all the answers. But they don’t. And, of course, we don’t either. In the face of our own broken communities, in this season of penitence and expectation, we struggle to begin conversations that may lead to healing and restoration. It is wise to reflect on how resistant we are to believing that we desperately need to know this. Even so, God is faithful and it is God who calls us to the fellowship of Christ. More than any other gift, this is the one with the greatest value of all. May we be able to deepen our relationship with our God who is ever faithful, and allow ourselves to be called into the healing and reconciling work of the Kingdom of God.
Merciful Lord: This Advent, may the deepening knowledge that God is faithful become the center of our discourse. May we find courage to address the great divisions among us, as we watch and yearn for the Prince of Peace to be born in us again, and again. Grant us strength to follow your call to begin conversations that restore fellowship and overcome division. In the name of our calling Savior, Jesus the Christ. Amen.
Rose Niles
Development Associate
For the glory of God and to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ, Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary is a seminary in the Presbyterian-Reformed tradition whose mission is to educate and equip individuals for the ordained Christian ministry and other forms of Christian service and leadership; to employ its resources in the service of the church; to promote and engage in critical theological thought and research; and to be a winsome and exemplary community of God's people.
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