Advent

We celebrate Advent as the beginning of the Church Year. It begins on the fourth Sunday before Christmas Day. We began on November 29. Advent ends on Christmas Eve (Dec 24). The word Advent means "the coming" or "arrival." The focus of the entire season is the anticipation of the birth of Jesus the Christ in his first coming (in the past) and the anticipation of the return of Christ the King in his second coming (in the future). The Bible readings in Advent are about waiting for Jesus to come – both the first time and the second time. We don’t celebrate Christmas at House of ROC until after December 25. We call this celebration “incarnation.” It is one of our two big parties of the year (the other is our Seder at Easter). We see Advent as a time of expectation, anticipation, preparation, and longing. It is about simplicity, penitence and hope. Normally, the color of Advent is blue. We emphasize darkness during Advent to remind us about waiting for coming of Jesus – the light.