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The Big Idea: The name Emmanuel means “God with us.” From both the Hebrew and Christian narratives, we hear the yearning for this “Emmanuel”–for God to become so present that God’s peace, truth, love, and justice reign among all the world and bring balance to what feels out of whack. Our Psalm in this series names the joyful expression of all creation as the response to the news that the Prince of Peace, Emmanuel, is coming at long last. The symbol for today is the star.

The Big Idea: Human beings can be transformed by music that resonates in our soul so powerfully that we can’t help but join in. This is the vision of “Joy to the World” as the reverberating phrase urges us to “repeat the sounding joy” of the good news of Love. The prophet Isaiah offers a vision of radical love–the wolf and the lamb living together and being led by an innocent child. Can we lift our voices to joyfully and confidently proclaim this chorus of well-being for the world? The symbol for today is the evergreen.

The Big Idea: The season of Advent is a time of preparing room, a whole season to practice Hope, the theme of today's Advent candle. Isaiah's prophecy looked to the future of a peace, where war was recognized as a fruitless enterprise. Israel was called to prepare room, where Justice and Joy could be anticipated with Hope. Israel was being invited to see that in the Lord's light, all can be free. The symbol for today is the wreath.

The Big Idea: Even as Jeremiah was beginning his exile in Egypt, he sent a letter to those who had been exiled to Babylon: “bloom where you are planted” says Jeremiah. God invited the people to “build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat what they produce.” The people were not to live “on hold” but live fully in the midst of exile. Indeed, the Babylonian exile created the spread of the Jews far and wide as they grew and prospered right where they found themselves. God's plans for them and their own welfare turned out to be a blessing for the communities where Jews and Gentiles lived together.

The Big Idea: Jeremiah’s prophetic visions of hope in the midst of despair take a turn with what seems like a bizarre act: Jeremiah buys property from prison. In a time of overwhelming and seemingly never-ending death and destruction of his people and no assurance that he will ever be free again, Jeremiah chooses to plan for a restored future he cannot yet see. He puts the deeds in earthward jars, a common ancient practice for the safekeeping of important documents. No matter what, we are called to prophecy and safeguard the dream of a better future for all people.

The Big Idea: To journey with Jeremiah is not an easy task. So often we just want our grieving to be over for good. We want to move on to better news and arise out of a “funk” that seems to be lingering. But life doesn’t always work that way. Grief is something that comes back up out of the blue, especially when we just can’t seem to shake a string of difficult circumstances. Time has passed for God’s people and still they are exiled from their home land. But rather than hold back the tears, God’s words invite a “fountain of tears” that can become the healing balm so desperately needed in hard times.

The Big Idea: A message from the church's Vision Team.

The Big Idea: When we feel at our lowest about life, we, too, can feel alone and see life as a wasteland–or little broken pieces–with little to offer. In our Jeremiah journey this week, God looks at the state of affairs and despairs… and yet… God does not “end it.” Instead, God still calls them “MY people” and, like a parent despite being at their wits end, does not abandon.