In case you'd missed it - Christmas is coming. We know Christmas is coming because all the big shops have started with their Christmas decorations and all the major retailers have started with their TV Christmas advertising campaigns. And every year it seems as if Christmas starts earlier and earlier - mainly as retailers try to maximise the amount of money they can squeeze out of people as they create this picture of a perfect Christmas.
The church has time of preparation in the run up to Christmas to allow Christians to get ready and prepare for the celebration of the birth of Jesus. This has nothing to do with turkeys and chocolates and presents though. This is the season of Advent which starts in a few weeks' time.
Most people today, probably know the word 'Advent' in connection with the word 'calendar'. An Advent Calendar usually contains 24 or 25 windows which you start opening on the 1 December, and behind each window there is a chocolate - and these calendars are available in a whole range of designs - Disney Princesses, Moshi Monsters, etc etc etc.
But this year you can buy 'The Real Advent Calendar' from The Meaningful Chocolate Company - the people behind the Real Easter Egg that's been around for a few years now.
The picture on the front is a cartoon Nativity, and behind each window there is a chocolate star, but on the back of the window is a sentence which tells a bit of the Christmas story - day by day. Here's a bit more detail.
To find out more, including details of where you can buy this Advent Calendar, visit their website by clicking here.
Yesterday evening I helped roll a few sheets of yellow paper, blue paper, white paper, and a few colouring sheets together in to rolls.
Other people made up bags of sweets, bottled beads, boxed jewellery, sorted hats into age categories, and covered shoe boxes in wrapping paper.
Why? We were making fillers for shoeboxes.
This coming week we will start processing shoe boxes for Operation Christmas Child's Shoebox Appeal. Although people are encouraged to fill their shoe boxes we do come across a lot of boxes that are maybe only half full. Other times we find items that we have to take out of a box and this leaves a gap. This is when we need our supply of fillers.
The rolls of paper might be used in a box where someone has included colouring pencils but has not put in any paper.
These are great re-cycling opportunities! A lot of the stuff we use for fillers comes from the Watford Arts Recycling Project (WRAP). For example you can take an empty video box - remove the sleeve and replace with a piece of wrapping paper - fill with pencils and pens and you have a pencil case. Or a small plastic bottle with screw top lid: fill with a range of coloured beads, add some thread or string and you have necklace making kit.
Over recent years a number of churches have moved into warehouses and converted them into churches. For three weeks in November we turn our church into a warehouse - as we become a satellite processing centre for Operation Christmas Child.
You can find out more about OCC's shoebox appeal by clicking here.
This morning we received our first 150 boxes that need to be processed - although we won't actually start that process until the middle of next week.
Last year we saw 3879 boxes pass through the church. This year we're hoping to process even more.
Yesterday I had an email from some friends who work in Thailand and who have some loose links with an organisation called Sports Friends Thailand. They posted a link to this video that shows how a group of ladies who knit in northern England support this ministry for young people on the other side of the world.
I have written this post not because I know anything about Sports Friends or because I want to encourage you to support them but because I think this is a great example that demonstrates how anyone can use their talents and their passions to support mission.
Whether you're a runner, a baker, a knitter, a reader, a gardener, a crafter or a builder I'm sure you can think of ways in which you can get involved in supporting whatever mission organisations you or your church are already linked to.
