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Advent - December Updates
9 years ago
General
Take no one at their word, but test everything against what you know to be true: the Bible. Be like the Bereans (Acts 17:11).
Howdy everyone! Jude here.
Sorry to keep you folks waiting so long between updates, but rest assured, that I'm working on getting CF back up and running as smoothly as I can. I could definitely use prayers and volunteers and perhaps another 10 hours in the day. But if you've sent me an email or a note in the last month or two regarding helping out or having ideas, please either send them to me again, or bear with me just a little longer while I go through every!
---
Happy Advent!
Advent comes from the Latin term for "arrival" and refers to the weeks leading up to Christmas Day. It's one of the ways that early Christians tried to help themselves focus on the realities of God's love and holiness.
There are 5 weeks of Advent, each one representing a different virtue of the Gospel leading up to the "big day" of Christmas. This year Advent started on November 27.
Week 1: Hope - Advent is a time of waiting and hoping. We wait expectantly for the time when we celebrate the Incarnation, the birth of Jesus into our world. We hope that everyone will come to know, love and worship Jesus.
Week 2: Love - Advent is a time of love. John 3.16 says "God loved the world in this way..." and so we celebrate His love in sending His Son. Some don't rightly know the love of others, so it can be difficult for them to understand God's love. We strive to remember God's love so we can share it with others.
Week 3: Joy - The joy of Advent is not the same as happiness. Joy is that deep feeling that comes from knowing that God cares for us. When we look foward to Christmas, we know the joy that comes from remembering that God sent Jesus so that we could always know of God's care for us, even when times are hard.
Week 4: Peace - When sin entered the world, peace was marred. No longer could people know peace in themselves, peace with others or most importantly peace with the God who loves them. The peace of Advent is more than just the calm that comes when a quarrel is over between friends, or that sense when warring parties stop. This is peace with God, where, thanks to the Savior, we can stop our quarrel with the Lord, and cease warring against Him.
Dec 25: Jesus - Advent is the season of waiting for our Lord's arrival in his birth. So of course, on Christmas Day our waiting has ended! But in a deeper sense while our Savior and His Kingdom is here, it's not yet here as well. As we celebrate our Lord's birth, we look forward to that still future time of his Second Advent, when he will come and rule without rivals in our world and in our lives.
Most evangelical churches in the US don't make a practice of celebrating Advent, but if yours does, or even if you just do it personally at home, why not send us a note or make your own journal post about how it's going what you've learned or something that God's showed you this time of year?
---
For those who are interested in connecting to the community in a bit more tangible way, we currently have group chats in Telegram, Skype and in Discord.
We just ask that you behave yourselves, stay respectful of nature of these chats - Christian - and don't go around proclaiming a false gospel. (We'll be getting a good set of guidelines and rules to follow together shortly).
Telegram Group
Skype Group
Discord Group
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If you ever want to revive your faith, read through the Hawaiian Pidgin translation of the Gospels. It may sound silly to those unaccustomed to hearing it, but as you parse your way through, perhaps with another English translation nearby, you may find that you understand what the Lord is saying a bit clearer.
God wen get so plenny love an aloha fo da peopo inside da world, dat he wen send me, his one an ony Boy, so dat everybody dat trus me no get cut off from God, but get da real kine life dat stay to da max foeva. You know, God neva send me, his Boy, inside da world fo punish da peopo. He wen send me fo take da peopo outa da bad kine stuff dey doing. Whoeva stay trus me, God no goin punish dem. But whoeva no trus me, garans God goin punish dem, cuz dey neva trus me, Godʼs ony Boy. John 3.16-18
---
Remember, friends, the primary way that our love for Jesus manifests is through obeying him (John 14.15). It's not legalism or becoming a pharisee to examine what the Lord expects of us and then to just do so willingly, but instead, it brings with it the highest sort of freedom. Are you living for Jesus today? Do you love him and want to be like him?
Sorry to keep you folks waiting so long between updates, but rest assured, that I'm working on getting CF back up and running as smoothly as I can. I could definitely use prayers and volunteers and perhaps another 10 hours in the day. But if you've sent me an email or a note in the last month or two regarding helping out or having ideas, please either send them to me again, or bear with me just a little longer while I go through every!
---
Happy Advent!
Advent comes from the Latin term for "arrival" and refers to the weeks leading up to Christmas Day. It's one of the ways that early Christians tried to help themselves focus on the realities of God's love and holiness.
There are 5 weeks of Advent, each one representing a different virtue of the Gospel leading up to the "big day" of Christmas. This year Advent started on November 27.
Week 1: Hope - Advent is a time of waiting and hoping. We wait expectantly for the time when we celebrate the Incarnation, the birth of Jesus into our world. We hope that everyone will come to know, love and worship Jesus.
Week 2: Love - Advent is a time of love. John 3.16 says "God loved the world in this way..." and so we celebrate His love in sending His Son. Some don't rightly know the love of others, so it can be difficult for them to understand God's love. We strive to remember God's love so we can share it with others.
Week 3: Joy - The joy of Advent is not the same as happiness. Joy is that deep feeling that comes from knowing that God cares for us. When we look foward to Christmas, we know the joy that comes from remembering that God sent Jesus so that we could always know of God's care for us, even when times are hard.
Week 4: Peace - When sin entered the world, peace was marred. No longer could people know peace in themselves, peace with others or most importantly peace with the God who loves them. The peace of Advent is more than just the calm that comes when a quarrel is over between friends, or that sense when warring parties stop. This is peace with God, where, thanks to the Savior, we can stop our quarrel with the Lord, and cease warring against Him.
Dec 25: Jesus - Advent is the season of waiting for our Lord's arrival in his birth. So of course, on Christmas Day our waiting has ended! But in a deeper sense while our Savior and His Kingdom is here, it's not yet here as well. As we celebrate our Lord's birth, we look forward to that still future time of his Second Advent, when he will come and rule without rivals in our world and in our lives.
Most evangelical churches in the US don't make a practice of celebrating Advent, but if yours does, or even if you just do it personally at home, why not send us a note or make your own journal post about how it's going what you've learned or something that God's showed you this time of year?
---
For those who are interested in connecting to the community in a bit more tangible way, we currently have group chats in Telegram, Skype and in Discord.
We just ask that you behave yourselves, stay respectful of nature of these chats - Christian - and don't go around proclaiming a false gospel. (We'll be getting a good set of guidelines and rules to follow together shortly).
Telegram Group
Skype Group
Discord Group
---
If you ever want to revive your faith, read through the Hawaiian Pidgin translation of the Gospels. It may sound silly to those unaccustomed to hearing it, but as you parse your way through, perhaps with another English translation nearby, you may find that you understand what the Lord is saying a bit clearer.
God wen get so plenny love an aloha fo da peopo inside da world, dat he wen send me, his one an ony Boy, so dat everybody dat trus me no get cut off from God, but get da real kine life dat stay to da max foeva. You know, God neva send me, his Boy, inside da world fo punish da peopo. He wen send me fo take da peopo outa da bad kine stuff dey doing. Whoeva stay trus me, God no goin punish dem. But whoeva no trus me, garans God goin punish dem, cuz dey neva trus me, Godʼs ony Boy. John 3.16-18
---
Remember, friends, the primary way that our love for Jesus manifests is through obeying him (John 14.15). It's not legalism or becoming a pharisee to examine what the Lord expects of us and then to just do so willingly, but instead, it brings with it the highest sort of freedom. Are you living for Jesus today? Do you love him and want to be like him?
For instance, does it ban anyone who doesn't believe that the authority Jesus gave to Peter has passed, unbroken, to Pope Francis? Does it ban anyone who does? Because one of the two is false, yet a belief held by millions of Christians. If both Catholics and non-Catholics are allowed to proclaim their faith, then what good does this ban on proclaiming falsehood do?
That's the trouble with having a limit like that. I say as long as someone's beliefs can be reasonably supported to be Christian, even if they differ from other people's in a group's, they should be welcome in any faith community that isn't specifically labeled as for a certain subset or denomination.
0.) The CFF is NOT A CHURCH neither is it to be a replacement for church.
1.) The Great Commandment (Matthew 22:36-38)
2.) The second "like unto it" (Matthew 22:38-40)
3.) The Golden Rule (Matthew 7:12)
4.) The Ten Commandments (Exodus 20)
5.) Be respectful of the Lord and others.
6.) Do not encourage anything clearly sinful (if you have to ask, it's best refrain).
7.) Do not flood or spam the chat (more than four messages back to back with no one else in between is excessive).
8.) Be respectful and listen to the leadership in place.
Thanks for teaching this to me, maybe I cannot celebrate all the weeks, but I can still celebrate a few ones until christmas!