Dear Westwood Family,

This Advent, we encourage you to turn attention to the things you fear. We trust that, in naming and holding them together, we might move through our fears with hope. All through this season, including in our worship at Westwood UMC, Dr. Carter and I invite you to join in the courageous practice of hope.

We have resources to share, in addition to Sunday worship, including a free devotional. You can pick up a hard copy (if you haven’t already) on Sunday, or use the online devotional. You can spend time with the poetry, art, and reflections in the devotional on your own, or with others.

This year’s Advent devotional asks you to consider: What do you fear? 

CLICK HERE to access the online devotional.

The devotional also offers a lantern logo-image for the season. It was inspired by a vision of hands gently cupped around candles at a vigil. When we gather at a vigil, fear is often present, weighing on us like a heavy fog. The candle in our hands can feel fragile, insignificant, the flame easily extinguished. But when we turn to our neighbors to spread the light, it multiplies, wrapping the whole community in warmth. The darkness is not eradicated; if anything, it further illuminates the flicker of the candles. In these vigil spaces, grief and fear dance with gratitude and hope. In these spaces, we find courage and unity. We are reminded that God is near. This vision captures our prayer for this Advent series: that it will illuminate both our hopes and our fears and remind us that God is near.

Similarly, lanterns are often used to light the way as we gently step forward into unseen or unknown territory. The lantern, like hope, steadies our hands and eyes as we walk forward through the night. In the logo, a lantern contains the swirl of a flame—it’s active and powerful, like the Holy Spirit, and like the hope that burns inside us. The candlelight cannot be contained, and so, like hope, it grows, emanating into our guiding question for the season, “What do you fear?” The background image captures the beauty of both dark and light, in the patterned shadows cast from a lantern. From this ethereal space where our greatest fears greet our most palpable hopes, possibility emerges.

I encourage you to use this season as a time to hold space for reflection, prayer, and hope.

grace and peace,
Pastor Molly