(Broad Street UMC / Statesville, NC 2005)
As we approach Christmas, we buy presents in preparation to give to our friends and neighbors. But how can we prepare to welcome Jesus who is at the heart of the season? (From: “Cloth for the Cradle”)
1.) An empty manger is placed on the altar table beginning the first Sunday of Advent
2.) Each person is given an 18” strip of soft cloth/linen and asked to keep it with them at all times during Advent. Tie is around your wrist. Tie it around the strap of your pocketbook. Keep it in your pocket. Place it on the table where you have your morning/evening devotionals.
3.) Have the cloth strips available each Sunday for those who didn’t receive them initially.
4.) Encourage the congregation each week to consider how they might prepare their hearts to be a soft and welcoming place for the Christ-child. This Advent focus is more of a preparation of one’s heart to receive the Christ-child. So, sermons could and probably should be centered around this thought.
5.) The final Sunday of Advent, everyone is asked to bring their strips of linen back to the worship service.
6.) At one point in the service (before the sermon most probably), each person is asked to tie his/her strip of cloth to the person’s strip of cloth next to them until each pew has one long strip of cloth.
7.) Have the ushers (or better yet, youth) gather the long strips up in baskets and take out of the sanctuary.
8.) At the end of the service, the strips of linen were brought in by our children, not in baskets but the children holding onto the cloth in a long line. They walked up to the manger where someone was standing to receive the cloth and softly place them into the manger.
9.) The cradle has now been softened by our four weeks of our prayers, our sermons, our personal response to the Christ-child and our strips of linen.
As we approach Christmas, we buy presents in preparation to give to our friends and neighbors. But how can we prepare to welcome Jesus who is at the heart of the season? (From: “Cloth for the Cradle”)
1.) An empty manger is placed on the altar table beginning the first Sunday of Advent
2.) Each person is given an 18” strip of soft cloth/linen and asked to keep it with them at all times during Advent. Tie is around your wrist. Tie it around the strap of your pocketbook. Keep it in your pocket. Place it on the table where you have your morning/evening devotionals.
3.) Have the cloth strips available each Sunday for those who didn’t receive them initially.
4.) Encourage the congregation each week to consider how they might prepare their hearts to be a soft and welcoming place for the Christ-child. This Advent focus is more of a preparation of one’s heart to receive the Christ-child. So, sermons could and probably should be centered around this thought.
5.) The final Sunday of Advent, everyone is asked to bring their strips of linen back to the worship service.
6.) At one point in the service (before the sermon most probably), each person is asked to tie his/her strip of cloth to the person’s strip of cloth next to them until each pew has one long strip of cloth.
7.) Have the ushers (or better yet, youth) gather the long strips up in baskets and take out of the sanctuary.
8.) At the end of the service, the strips of linen were brought in by our children, not in baskets but the children holding onto the cloth in a long line. They walked up to the manger where someone was standing to receive the cloth and softly place them into the manger.
9.) The cradle has now been softened by our four weeks of our prayers, our sermons, our personal response to the Christ-child and our strips of linen.
Christmas Eve for "Cloth for the Christ-child"(see picture above)
On Christmas Eve, the manger is still in place. However, there are soft lights shining from the strips of linen (we used fresh strips of linen for Christmas Eve). The Christ-child is here!
To continue this theme of "Cloth for the Christ-child" throughout the church year, I entered into a conversation a year ago with some who shared these thoughts...
Weaving our Faith Through the Fabric of Jesus Christ"
"I don't feel like I've been sewn into the fabric, but that the fabric of Christ fits perfectly - seamlessly. The cloth of our faith has an amazing story on it." Dennis
Dennis went on to share Galatians 3:27 with me ... "As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ." and then continued by saying ....
"It seems to me that this text is about our identity. The identity we
have in our baptism as a child of God. I really like the 'baptized
into Christ...clothed with Christ...one in Christ...belong to Christ'.
Isn't our identity wrapped up in Christ? Isn't Jesus the fabric of
our lives? Shouldn't the light of Christ shimmer upon the cloth of
Christ which we are wrapped in?" Dennis
As he shared this with me, I realized that the softening of our hearts during the Advent season using the strips of linen and the visual softening of the manger could very well lead us into sermons throughout the year based on "Weaving our Faith Through the Fabric of Jesus Christ, using the following thoughts and visuals ...
• The strips of linen/swaddling cloths at his birth
• The hem of his garment (the woman touching the hem of his garment)
• The prayer shawl (talit or tallis) “he went off to a solitary place to pray”
• the servant's towel,
• the purple robe
• the seamless robe
• the linen strips found in the empty tombs.
We are wrapped in it all...every last yard of it...we are clothed with Christ.
"
anna murdock
Broad Street UMC / Statesville, NC
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