Advent 2022
Your Guide to Advent at Midway Hills
The shiny additions to our Advent and Christmas visuals remind us that we are called to reflect the sacred each and every day. “Incarnation” is a word that means that God’s presence came to dwell among all people, and we believe this happened in a special way in the birth of Jesus. All creation has always been imbued with the Creator’s brilliance. This season, may we remember the call to shine with this holy light.
Below is a guide to all of this season's services and special programming.
Reflections at Midway Hills Holiday Gallery
View photos of our space, decorated for the holiday season.
Alternative Christmas Photo Gallery
Check out photos from this year's in person event!
World Aids Day Rememberance
Thursday, December 1, 2022 at Noon
We join people all over the world as we come to remember those who have died and those who are living with HIV/AIDS. We also remember those who are working to stop the AID pandemic, those who are caregivers; those who mourn and those who are working against stigma and discrimination.
Sacred Time - Advent Week 1
Sunday, November 27, 2022 at 11 am
The busy-ness of the holiday season can overrun the sense of the sacred. The irony is that setting apart time for connection with the sacred gets pushed aside in order to create the trappings of what is supposed to be the season of celebrating the incarnation of the Holy! Let us begin our Advent journey with the gift of sacred time with God, with each other, and with those in need of hope.
Sacred People - Advent Week 2
Sunday, December 4, 2022 at 11 am
When we look through the lens of the sacred, we prepare our senses to recognize the holy in all people–to come to know them in a “steadfast and encouraging” way. Our world is crying out for harmony and being able to see the Christ reflected in each other makes a path for this to be accomplished. We are inspired as part of the call to be sacred people who usher in the presence of love.
Sacred Space - Advent Week 3
Sunday, December 11, 2022 at 11 am
The pregnancy of Mary is connected to the promise of justice and joy in the readings this week. Mary’s womb becomes a sacred space for the gestation of grace that moves into, and is transforming, the world. We will ponder the spaces we inhabit at home, work, and community, asking whether they are feeding, nurturing, and reflecting the freedom and joy that is so desperately needed.
Blue Christmas
Wednesday, December 14, 2022 at 6:30 pm in the Narthex
The holidays can be a difficult time for those of us who are dealing with loss of some kind. It can feel like the whole world is going on around us, business as usual, and we seem to be on another planet, or “down in the pit,” as the Psalmist describes it. Even if we’ve been living with our loss for a time, grief has a way of showing up and crashing over us like an unexpected wave when a certain song comes on or someone says something that reminds us of our loss.
Sacred Knowing - Advent Week 4
Sunday, December 18, 2022 at 11 am
Uncertainty is a fact of life-this seems ever more true. This week we will remember that there is a Christ within us constantly birthing wisdom and a deep knowing if we will but listen with a contemplative heart. Let us seek out quiet in order to hear the voice that brings peace by gently saying, “do not be afraid.”
Christmas Eve
Saturday, December 24, 2022 at 7 pm
Sacred Being - It is not difficult to imagine this night as “reflecting the sacred.” We gather and sing and light candles and dare to believe that love truly enters the world time and again and anything is possible. What may be more difficult to understand, however, is that this love is ours, not because we’ve been “good” (as if God is Santa Claus), but simply because we are beloved–the firstborn of God. Our very being reflects the sacred. The incarnation of God in human flesh is proof.
Christmas Day
Sunday, December 25, 2022 at 11 am
Surprisingly Sacred - In the early church, Sunday was known as the “day of light.” And so it is special when Christmas falls on a Sunday, as it does in 2022. As light dawns on this morning, as the children scramble to the tree to see what has appeared, we remember that the sacred comes in the form of surprise sometimes, just as it did when light and life was known anew in the form of a baby in a humble stable. Can we dare to believe that we can know a surprising calm even in the midst of anxiety because of the in-breaking of this Prince of Peace upon our lives each and every day?
Sacred Doing - Sunday After Christmas
Sunday, January 1, 2023 at 11 am
We’ve looked through the lens of the sacred and have experienced time, people, places, others, and ourselves as God’s holy love reflected and incarnate in the world. Because of the experience of God’s action of love toward us, we are called also to act, the “sacred doing” of alleviating suffering wherever it is found. We dedicate ourselves in this New Year to sacred acts of justice and mercy, bringing grace to a hurting world, reflecting the sacred in all we do.