For the Advent Newsletter

Dream a dream, a hopeful dream...

Dream a time, this Christmas time...
Dream a peace, our planet’s peace...
Dream a gift, the Christmas Gift
that changes everything we see...
(Words from Dream a Dream by Shirley Erena Murray, #158 in More Voices)

We are entering the time of preparation and waiting we call Advent. Four weeks of lighting candles and preparing our hearts for the birth of a baby who will change the world. As we get ourselves ready for Emmanuel, God-With-Us to be born what dreams fill your heart, soul and mind this year? What does Christmas need to bring for the magic of The Word becoming flesh to re-energize your world as we move into 2026?

Dreams are important, they help us envision a world renewed and re-vitalized. Dreams remind us that there is another possible reality. In our faith stories dreams are often a way that God communicates with God’s people (it happens 4 times just in the first 2 chapters of Matthew!). What dreams has God placed on your soul this year?

This year as we gather on the four Sundays of Advent I invite us to be open to the power of dreams. The theme I have chosen for the season is The Christmas Dream:____. Each Sunday we will finish the phrase with one of our Advent themes: Awakened Hope, Transformative Peace, Blosoming Joy, and Embodied Love. Sometime between now and then I will figure out how we might finish the phrase for Christmas Eve itself. When you think of Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love what dreams stir in your heart?

The weeks leading into Christmas can get very busy and hectic, but let’s take time to pause and listen. Let us dream together. Let us share our dreams with each other. May we be open to how God is speaking to our hearts and minds as we prepare for God to change the world by becoming one of us, to walk around among us. In 4 weeks a baby will be born. We will sing carols and remember shepherds and angels. Hope, peace, joy and love will break into our lives again. Life can be a dream. Dream along with me.
--Gord