Description
Why Write this Book? (from the Preface)
“We love Christmas with all its wonders:
the infant Christ-child born in the stable, Mary and Joseph,
the angels, the shepherds, the star in the heavens,
the incredible story freshly told each year.
We love Christmas with all its festivities:
the trees, lights, candles, delicious delicacies,
presents, pageants, programs,
family get-togethers, friends, and traditions.
We love Christmas…
but what our hearts truly year for is Advent:
the forgotten season, the four weeks before Christmas,
the pregnancy before the birth,
the anticipation before the reality.
What we really need is not another month of Christmas, but a true Advent season:
-a time to prepare for God’s greatest gift,
to ponder gifts and giving,
to consider the miracle of birth and of life itself,
to accept all that we have received as a gift.
-a time to wait, to treasure expectation,
to embrace the pregnancy of earthly life,
to touch a time that moves beyond each day or hour,
to practice patience.
-a time to turn from wrong habits and ideas,
from ourselves and our concerns
toward the holy face of God,
to re-orient our lives ,to be transformed and redirected,
to look outward and inward.
-a time to repent, to admit our failures and our brokenness,
to confess to those whom we’ve wounded,
to experience the liberation of our bondage to sin and death,
to invite healing and renewal.
-a time to hope for the healing of this fractured world,
for peace where there is war or violence,
for justice for those who have been beaten down,
for the triumph of good over evil.
-a time to imagine a new heave and a new earth,
to glimpse God’s holy vision,
to taste a morsel of God’s heavenly feat that awaits,
to dream of heavenly mansions.”
About the Author:
Pam González, poet and pastor, lives with her husband and two children in Northern Colorado. Her years of ministry, as well as life experiences, have let her see into the complexity of human relationships. Pam has also written a collection of poetry entitled, Climbing the Wreckage.
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“Here is a great resource for a congregation’s Advent Hymnody! pamela J. González, using Advent lectionary texts as her inspiration, Christmas tunes are her structure, and her own gifts of words and faith has written hymns with clear Advent messages that are both theologically sound and structurally solid. Her poetry is simple and profound. Congregations and choirs will enjoy singing her Carols for the Advent Season.” –Dr. Frank L. Benz, Dean of the Luther Academy of the Rockies, Preofessor Emeritus, Wartburg Theological Seminary
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“Here is a gentle sequence of songs and carols – new words, glad breathless lines, a bright expectant Advent joy. The rhythms of the poetry rejoice in the old familiar rhythms and melodic flights of the music. Sing the old carols new.” —Walter Wangerin, Jr. pastor, poet, author, faculty member of Valparaiso University, Lutheran Vespers speaker
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“People love to sing Christmas carols. These songs allow them to sing the familiar tunes, while not rushing the season and still observing Advent. It’s a wonderful idea.” —Louis Williams, Executive Director of the Lutheran Deaconess Association, President of DIAKONIA of the Americas and the Caribbean
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“The season of Advent is a treasure and one of my favorite times in our worship cycle. Pam González has given us a wonderful gift. These carols will increase our appreciation of the great blessings of Advent and take us deeper into the ancient gifts.” —-Bishop Allen Bjornberg, Rocky Mountain Synod (ELCA)