November/December issue highlights from Martin
In the weeks covered by this issue, lectionary year A comes to an end, and year B begins – Mark’s year. Although, of course, Luke always features strongly in retelling the Christmas story – not least because Mark does not tell us anything at all about Jesus’ birth or early years. But first, the final few weeks of Matthew – three of which have us wrestling with the whole of Matthew chapter 25 through three parables: the bridesmaids who failed to prepare properly, the slave who failed to use the talents they were given, and the challenging story of the sheep and the goats.
Advent, turning now to Mark, offers themes of staying alert, looking for Jesus and asking questions, and leads us to the risk of saying ‘Yes!’ to God, as Mary did. And, we stay with the risky theme with the all-age service offered as part of the Christmas resources: Risky Christmas is a fun and informal way to explore the nativity story and its impact on us today.
To complement the above, our new Bread & Wine section offers all-age Communion resources for the Advent and Christmas seasons. And this issue’s Discovering God explores a very appropriate seasonal theme: Angels.
What are we to make of them? In addition, in this period that features readings from all four Gospels, Tim Herbert asks why we need all four and what the differences are between them - see this issue's Scripture in context.
Finally, Andy Flannagan adds to our archive of music support resources with an article on the importance of using language that reflects modern daily life in our sung worship.
Please don’t forget to let us know how you are getting on with the new-look resources and, if you have any stories to share – for example, of how you have used any of the Roots’ resources (photos always welcome), especially the new Bread & Wine resources, or how you approach intergenerational/all-age Communion – we would love to hear from you.
Martin Adams,
Adult & All Age Editor
martin.adams@rootsforchurches.com