Take time to stop and think

It can be hard to stay focussed on the reason we celebrate in the midst of all the pressures and busy-ness. Advent is a season of spiritual preparation which runs alongside all the practical preparations for Christmas, but it’s so easy for it to get lost, for us to skip straight to nativity plays and carol services. This Advent, will you join me in trying to take time to stop and think, to wonder at what it is that we’re preparing to celebrate, so that when the day finally arrives we will be caught up not just in when to put the turkey on and who’s bringing the crackers, but in the amazing truth that God loves us enough to have become one of us so that he might walk among us, teach us, and die that we might be drawn close to him.

Helen Jenkins (an extract from her leader in the December issue of St Margaret’s magazine)