Devotions for the Week

Devotion based on the scripture from November 30, 2025.

Advent Signs

Few things in life are as jarring as awakening to the shriek of a fire alarm. Of course, that is by design. The safety of those gathered indoors calls for a blaring warning of impending danger so that all might be delivered from harm. Jesus offers a similar signal to his beloveds today, begging us to pay attention to the seriousness of the message he bears: Be ready! Keep awake! Pay attention to your surroundings! Deliverance is coming soon!

Advent is a season of preparation, directing our focus toward the incarnation, toward Christmas, when God becomes human and the weary world rejoices. Sometimes preparations take the form of monthslong laborious planning, as we might do for an international trip or the renovation of a home. Other times, preparations must happen immediately, within hours, minutes, or seconds. When a fire alarm sounds, there’s no time to plan: We must act quickly, gathering what is most important to get to safety together.

This first Sunday of Advent is a chance to take stock of what is most important in life, to attune our spirits to the reign of heaven that God is birthing in our world. We may be unsettled by these gospel images of the great flood and of field workers being disappeared. Such stories indeed may spark fear, anxiety, and distrust. Yet God comes to be with us amid all the great uncertainties of life, amid the atrocities of human violence, amid the worst of our losses and fears. Jesus reminds us that God is always drawing near to the world, always extending mercy, always acting with love. Mercy and love are Advent signs worth paying attention to, worth staying awake for. Be ready, beloveds, and fear not! God’s deliverance is coming soon.

Items Available – The following items are available in the gathering space for you to take home and complete.

A Gift for All: 10 Christmas Reflections on God’s Gift to Us—Jesus
God’s greatest gift to us was His son, Jesus—our Savior, who died and rose again so that we may live eternally with Him. This unending gift is for everyone. With this truth, we get to be united with a diverse family of believers all over the world.

This Christmas season, you’re invited to set aside 10 days to reflect on what this means for you, and how you might share this good news with others.

Humble and Holy: Devotions for Advent & Christmas 2025-2026
Humble and Holy provides daily devotions for the first Sunday of Advent (November 30, 2025) through Epiphany (January 6, 2026). These devotions explore the humble and holy in year A scripture readings (in the Revised Common Lectionary) for Advent and Christmas, as well as for the festival days and commemorations in the Advent and Christmas seasons.

ELCA World Hunger Advent Calendar 2025
The Advent calendar evokes feelings of a welcoming hearth during the harsher months of winter. The activities inside start with a standing nativity scene, ready to be colored throughout the season. Alongside each day’s craft activity, the calendar includes: 1. Opportunities from ELCA Good Gifts to generously support the church’s national and global work to end poverty. 2. Everything you need to create “Stocking the Streets” bags for your unhoused neighbors. 3.Scripture, prayers and hymns for seasonal reflection.

Study Guide
This season’s ELCA World Hunger study guide provides reflection questions for engaging the brand-new, ELCA World Hunger–produced short video documentary “Intersections: Justice Ministry With ELCA Partners.” The video and study guide ask viewers to think differently about the root causes of hunger and poverty, making complex issues seem manageable through our collective action as the church.

Devotion – A Blog Post (from Augsburg Fortress newsletter)

Growing Roots: Advent, Thanksgiving, and the Not Yet Seen – Nov 6, 2025 9:00:00 AM / by Jia Starr Brown

We live in a society that rewards finish lines – deliverables, story endings, and checked boxes.

We have been indoctrinated to believe that outcomes are all that matter. The “here and not yet” of Jesus actively disputes this mindset, calling us Christians to faithfully live into the promise of what is to come…of all that is to come.

In this sacred dynamic, we have established a trusting relationship with God called “faith”, in which we are called to:

believe what we have not (yet) seen from God;
live according to what God has promised;

This is the primary focus of the Advent season.

And yet, it can be challenging to celebrate what is to come when this holy season intersects with the national observance of Thanksgiving – a time dedicated to expressing gratitude for who and what has already happened. Complicated at best, this holiday marks the muted historic harm of the genocide of Native Americans. Many do not have gratitude for all that has already happened…

We can plainly see the devastating ripples of this horror centuries later on this occasion as white supremacy culture attempts to upset the apple cart of our faith – tempting us to focus on happiness, wins, and accomplishments. Let’s be honest: so many people are experiencing a lot of pain and harm, and are not entering this season in a spirit of happiness. And that should not be a requirement.

Believing isn’t always happy, and neither is Advent. Choosing to celebrate (joy) in advance of resolution, restoration, and resurrection takes great courage and great faith. It calls us to reflect on God’s character, remaining poised with our party hats in the midst of our despair – believing that there will be a season for joy (to quote Ecclesiastes and my mother.)

Hope is such a powerful – and scarce – thing! By introducing the element of imagination, we can teach our young people to dream about the awesomeness of answered prayer.

Imagine the conversations that could blossom by inviting students to consider:

What would (will) change in their world/circumstance look like? What will it taste like?
What does God promise about that specific situation/issue?
Can we find a Scripture to cling to in this dry and barren Advent season that will point us to Christmas (and the change that we long for?)
How can we use our imagination, in concert with the text, to celebrate dreams that have not yet come to fruition?

Maybe it looks like planning an “Advent Thanksgiving” celebration where guests give thanks for future blessings. Or, teaching students to express gratitude in prayer to God for change that has “not yet” come.

Perhaps this is the Advent/Thanksgiving season fully realized: the incredible shift from the “theology of glory” to the “theology of the cross” – where we can come to Jesus’s dinner table with our whole broken selves, trusting that there will in fact be a seat for each of us, and enough bread for us all.

In your mercy, God…may it be so.

Amen.

Topics: Advent, community, faith, history, Thanksgiving, Hope, pain, waiting

Written by Jia Starr Brown