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Real God in the Real World: Advent and Christmas readings on the coming of Christ
Advent & Christmas, Resources for the Christian YearThis book offers a lively, engaging and accessible look at the theme of the Incarnation, the mysterious event at the heart of Christmas, using personal stories, illustrations from popular culture and the arts, as well as daily Bible readings. The starting-point is what the 'Word made flesh' means for us and how the first Christmas should still have an impact on our everyday lives. We will be taken on an absorbing journey to help us recognise the person of Jesus in the people we meet, the conversations we have, and even in our relationship with nature and the arts. By the end of our journey, we will not only recognise Christ in others but also in ourselves, as we model ourselves on him and share his love, compassion and peace with our neighbours, whoever they are and whatever their backgrounds.£4.00 -
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Feast + Fast: Food for Advent and Christmas
Advent & Christmas, Resources for the Christian YearChristmas is one of our best loved festivals. During the long dark days of winter, it gives the focus of a celebration to lift our hearts and spirits, and the food that goes along with it plays an enormous part. But the Christmas season isn't just about shopping, parties, presents and over-indulgence. Advent, the period leading up to Christmas, can also be an important time of spiritual as well as practical preparation. In this, Christina Rees's second collection of writings and recipes following Christian festivals, she explores the wonderful season of Advent and Christmas through the themes of Welcoming, Wondering, Giving, Receiving and Celebrating. With spiritual wisdom and recipes to guide us through the festive season (including Christina's original American turkey stuffing recipe as enjoyed and adapted by Delia Smith!), she provides inspiration for fantastic meals for family and friends, and insight for maintaining a fresh and positive perspective in the midst of all the seasonal activities. Feast + Fast – Food for Advent and Christmas is a rich and creative offering, perfect for anyone seeking joy and love that lie at the heart of Christmas.£7.99 -
Multicoloured Seasons
Advent & Christmas, Creativity, Lent & Easter, Resources for the Christian YearA collection of sixteen images to colour based around the Church Year, two images for each season starting at Advent, then Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, Easter, Ascension, Pentecost and Harvest with mediations on the reverse of each image.£4.49 -
The Christmas Creative Retreat Activity Book
Advent & Christmas, Creativity, Resources for the Christian YearThis book has been designed to be used from Christmas Day to Epiphany. It has been created to help you find moments of meaning amidst the mince pies and re-runs of old sit-coms. Be inspired by the stories of Saints and find peace with the activities. The Christmas Creative Retreat Activity Book offers a combination of meditations, prayers and activities. Some to challenge and some to help you relax and clear your mind and always to encourage you to hear the 'still, small voice'.£3.99 -
Jesse Tree Ornaments
Advent & Christmas, Celtic Daily Prayer & Liturgy, Music & Creativity, Northumbria Community Resources & Teaching, Resources for the Christian YearThe Jesse Tree has been used over many centuries to bring life to the characters who are part of Jesus' family Tree from Jesse through David to Joseph and Mary. This ornament pack contains three sheets of card printed with thirty-one double sided ornaments for you to colour, cut out and use to decorate your own Jesse Tree at home. Each ornament illustrates one of the Jesse Tree readings written by Andy Raine from the Northumbria Community. The readings themselves, one for each day in December, are available in Celtic Daily Prayer Book 2: Farther Up and Farther In published by Collins and available here Also available from the Northumbria Community is the Jesse Tree Pack which contains these card ornaments along with an A5 booklet of the readings - available here Your Jesse Tree can be made from anything you wish but many people use a branch which can be left in its natural state or stripped and painted gold, silver, white and then suspended from a ceiling or 'planted' in a pot. Instructions for preparing the ornaments are included in this pack.£3.50 -
The Advent Creative Retreat Activity Book
Advent & Christmas, Creativity, Resources for the Christian YearThe Advent Creative Retreat Activity Book is one of a series of Retreat books written and illustrated by Mary & Mark Fleeson. It's an A6 format, 20 page book with readings, prayers and activities split into sections to help you to take time out with God. This book gives an opportunity to discover some of the things that the approach to Christmas can teach us. It includes excerpts from Henry Van Dyke’s short story ‘The Other Wise Man’, come and join him as he seeks the King! The Advent Creative Retreat Activity Book offers a combination of meditations, prayers and activities. Some to challenge and some to help you relax and clear your mind and always to encourage you to hear the ‘still, small voice’.£3.99 -
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Advent and Christmas Wisdom with Henri Nouwen
Advent & Christmas, Resources for the Christian YearHenri J. M. Nouwen is one of the most beloved and well-read spiritual authors of our time. His works are popular among Christians of all denominations. This book of Advent and Christmas Wisdom will both challenge you and warm your heart during your annual preparation for the Lord's coming. Through the quotes, Nouwen share with the reader his own journey of waiting while seeking the Lord. Advent is that period of great anticipatory joy to prepare for the celebration of Christ's arrival in Bethlehem as a helpless infant. The date commemorating his birth begins the Christmas cycle of the liturgical year, a cycle that runs through the Sunday after the feast of the Epiphany. This book is designed to be used during the entire period from the First Sunday of Advent to the end of the Christmas season. Reflections for each day in this book begin with the words of Henri Nouwen taken from various sources of his writings. Following that quotation is an excerpt from Scripture related to the quote. Next is a small prayer based on the quote and the Scripture passage. Finally, an activity is suggested for applying the messages to one's daily life. All devotees of Nouwen will appreciate the applications made of his words of wisdom for daily living. Any Christian who is serious about his or her search for the Lord will cherish this book and want to use it from year to year.£10.00 -
Advent and Christmas wisdom from GK Chesterton
Advent & Christmas, Resources for the Christian YearAdvent and Christmas Wisdom from GK Chesterton is like an invitation to laugh and think from a friend and mentor. To quote the author: 'People are losing the power to enjoy Christmas through identifying it with enjoyment. When once they lose sight of the old suggestion that it is all about something, they naturally fall into blank pauses of wondering what it is all about. To be told to rejoice on Christmas Day is reasonable and intelligible, if you understand the name, or even look at the word. To be told to rejoice on the twenty-fifth of December is like being told to rejoice at quarter-past eleven on Thursday week. You cannot suddenly be frivolous unless you believe there is a serious reason for being frivolous.'£9.00GK Chesterton The New War on Christmas December 26 1925
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Advent and Christmas Wisdom with Thomas Merton
Advent & Christmas, Resources for the Christian YearAdvent and Christmas are special times for all Christians. The spiritual longing of the Advent season can only be satisfied by the joy and celebration of a Christmas focused on Jesus' birth in our hearts. Advent and Christmas Wisdom with Thomas Merton give readers the opportunity to experience Advent and Christmas in a way that unwraps the spiritual joy, allowing it to shine brighter that all the tinsel and trappings that can blind our eyes to the deeper meaning of the season. This book is arranged for use on every day of the Advent and Christmas seasons. Each day's reflection begins with a scriptural quotation, continues with a thought from the writings of Thomas Merton, and concludes with a prayer for the day. Merton's writing capture the familiar themes of the season: the Incarnation, anticipation, angels, giving, and many others - each drawing us closer to the joy of welcoming the Saviour into our lives. An appendix includes a suggested plan for using each day's meditation as part of a morning or evening prayer.£9.00 -
The Jesse Tree Pack
Advent & Christmas, Celtic Daily Prayer & Liturgy, Music & Creativity, Northumbria Community Resources & Teaching, Resources for the Christian YearCreate Your own Jesse Tree at home this Advent with this delightful and richly rewarding resource for individuals, families and churches. Originally published in Celtic Daily Readings (now out of print), this month of readings is presented as an A5 booklet beautifully illustrated with newly commissioned drawings by Francesca Ross, and accompanied by a set of 31 double-sided card ornaments, featuring Francesca’s illustrations, for you to colour, cut out and use at home on your own Jesse Tree. The Jesse Tree readings are named after the depictions in stained glass or wood that have been used over many centuries to bring to life the characters who are part of Jesus’ family tree from Jesse through David to Joseph and Mary. In many homes and churches it has become an Advent custom to use a small tree branch as a Jesse Tree and hang it with pictures or ornaments representing the people, prophecies and stories which anticipated the coming of Christ. Some churches have a special Jesse Tree service, during which the whole series of stories is recalled, and the ornaments added, one by one. At home it is probably more beneficial to take one reading, with its accompanying Scriptures, per day, adding the ornaments as you go through the month so that, rather like the pictures in an Advent calendar, more and more appear as Christmas approaches. Some of the drawings and readings remind us of the people who make up Jesus’ family tree. Some instead are rich in prophetic significance, or mark the feasts of Stephen, the ‘holy innocents’ and John the beloved. They remind us of the covenant that Jesus, the promised Messiah, invites us all to enter into with Him. The Jesse Tree can become a much-loved focal point during December that can offset and pre-empt the onset of an increasingly commercial and secularised Christmas. We hope these readings and ornaments will help you to share in this age-old practice and, by providing a focus for prayer and memory and a spur to the imagination, enrich your Advent as they take you on a journey through image and Scripture.£6.75
