Last Sunday was the end of the Church Year.

Last Sunday was the official end of the Church Year.  Next Sunday is the first Sunday of Advent.  Advent is about preparing ourselves for the arrival of Jesus at Christmas.  In Advent, we look for ways to make our hearts and lives more fit to receive Him.  A time of breaking unGodly ways and looking for beautiful ways to prepare our lives to welcome Him.  

Of course, He is always with us.  But He knows us, as He made us.  He knows as human beings we need the drama and majesty of different Liturgical seasons.  Ecclesiastes chapter 3 tells us that there is a time for everything under the sun.  Here is the NIV version.

A Time for Everything

1 There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under heaven:

2 a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,

3 a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,

4 a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,

5 a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain,

6 a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,

7 a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,

8 a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.

9 What does the worker gain from his toil?
10 I have seen the burden God has laid on men.
11 He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end.

12 I know that there is nothing better for men than to be happy and do good while they live.
13 That everyone may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all his toil—this is the gift of God.

14 I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that men will revere him. 

15 Whatever is has already been,
and what will be has been before;
and God will call the past to account.