ITLOTC
(In The Life Of The Church)
Pentecost
A Word about Advent and a New Song (by Jamie)
Greetings. As you may know, Ubcmusic is releasing our Magnificat EP next Friday, November 27th. This is pretty exciting for us, as it is the first project we’ve recorded in-house—mostly in my office and the adjacent meeting room. I don’t know that recording Ubc songs in the literal Ubc building adds anything special to the equation, but it’s fun to pretend.
Magnificat EP is a collection of Advent songs that we’ve written over the past several years (Or many years, as I wrote There Will Come A Light in like 2013 when I played guitar in the band but didn’t work here yet). If you’re new around here, or haven’t really gotten comfortable with the church calendar yet, Advent is the first season of the liturgical year (it starts on 11/29). N.T. Wright has described this season as an invitation to look around to see how dark the world is and how very badly it needs a light. This image is playing around with the description in John 1 of Jesus being a light that enters the darkness. As such, this noticing the gloom around us is a helpful way for setting some sort of posture to enter into Christmastide. It is difficult to appreciate the cosmos-altering notion of the Incarnation if you don’t have a sense of why such an alteration might be Good News. Advent helps us cultivate a sense of longing and anticipation in this way.
Advent invites us to take up this posture in at least two ways. The first is by hitting a hard-rewind of a couple thousand years and stepping into the story the liturgical calendar is telling: immersing ourselves in the longing of Israel, who are clinging to the stories of their people; stories that tell of God’s tangible, chain-breaking activity among them, even as they now find themselves under the boot of Empire. Questions like “Where is God?” and “Are these stories true now like they were then?” pervade the Psalms and prophets. They are awaiting a Messiah that will come and overthrow the powers that be and re-establish their peace and wholeness as a people. This vantage point helps when we get to the Magnificat, where Mary is singing a song of praise about the mighty being cast down from their thrones and the lowly lifted, allowing us to see more clearly the stakes of the coming of Christ.
The second vantage point Advent invites us to take up is our own—that of our particular time and place. Here in the future, we’ve seen how this story plays out: life, death, resurrection, and a coming redemption of all things. It’s our own story to which we cling, while sometimes (oftentimes?) raising questions like “Where is God?” and “Are these stories true now like they were then?” Advent invites us to lean into this line of questioning—to calibrate our attention toward a hope that there is Good News on the horizon, especially when all hope seems lost.
Okay, so that’s probably an insufficient intro to Advent, but the point of this post is actually to give you one of the songs from the EP. Last December, I wrote a song called Branch. It’s essentially an adaptation of a text from Isaiah 11, which is attached to the second week of Advent in Year A of the lectionary. I’m going to put that text alongside the lyrics below in case you want to see how that process went.
Isaiah 11:1-10
A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse,
and a branch shall grow out of his roots.
The spirit of the Lord shall rest on him,
the spirit of wisdom and understanding,
the spirit of counsel and might,
the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.
His delight shall be in the fear of the Lord.
He shall not judge by what his eyes see,
or decide by what his ears hear;
but with righteousness he shall judge the poor,
and decide with equity for the meek of the earth;
he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth,
and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked.
Righteousness shall be the belt around his waist,
and faithfulness the belt around his loins.
The wolf shall live with the lamb,
the leopard shall lie down with the kid,
the calf and the lion and the fatling together,
and a little child shall lead them.
The cow and the bear shall graze,
their young shall lie down together;
and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp,
and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den.
They will not hurt or destroy
on all my holy mountain;
for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord
as the waters cover the sea.
On that day the root of Jesse shall stand as a signal to the peoples; the nations shall inquire of him, and his dwelling shall be glorious.
Branch
behold, a branch shall come
from where the axe was laid
the root, unmarred by kings
will crown a sprout of Grace
the Spirit of the Lord
will rest upon him
his judgment will pierce
through both brand
and the best wording
with righteousness and peace
he will judge them
and decide with equity
for the poor and forgotten
but he shall strike the earth
with a tongue like a Javelin
and with a breath reduce to ash
the gloating wicked
and behold, when this branch comes
as wolves and lambs lay down
your children will be left unharmed
safe above the ground
for they will not hurt or destroy
on all my mountain
and all the earth will raise
the same refrain:
O Praise the Name beyond all Naming
open wide, ye gates, forsake your hinges
for the Branch is raised,
the beacon, lifted
to gather in the rest
to life, unbending
behold, a Branch shall come
and i know you’re tired
but set your heart to search for life
on every withered stump
Cesar Chavez Middle School Gift Cards
Greetings UBC Family. We are working on getting together gift cards to give the faculty/staff at CCMS, to thank them for all their hard work this semester. As many of you know, teaching during a pandemic is hard work!! We are looking to collect 100 $5 gift cards. You can buy $5 gift cards to Pinewood, Nightlight Donuts, Sonic, or Common Grounds. If you don’t have time to grab a gift card, you can also donate money. Gift cards are due tomorrow 11/18/20 by 5 P.M. You can drop your gift cards off in the mail slot at church, or a check. If you have any questions, please contact toph@ubwaco.org.
Smile @ UBC this Christmas
Hello friends. Some of you may already be thinking about what you can get for the special someone for the Christmas season. Perhaps a gift certificate to the farmers market. Maybe you’ll purchase a gift from a local business. Wow, we love those great ideas! In the event that Waco doesn’t have what you need and you purchase from amazon, please consider making UBC your second special someone by clicking this link. Maybe you’re not supporting Christmas present exchanges because you’re done with all of that. Still you can help us out by using Amazon smile for any Amazon purchase.
For those of you who don’t want to use the link above, here are some instructions from our fearless office manager Risse: “People can also set "University Baptist Church" as their charity of choice at smile.amazon.com, or they can turn Amazon Smile "On" in the settings of their Amazon app to make all their purchases count.”
Parishioner of the Week
EVERYONE. CONGRATS EVERYONE -j
Work is Worship
Greeters: No Greeters this week
Coffee Makers: no coffee makers this week
Mug Cleaners: no mug cleaners this week
Money Counter: no money counters this week
Leadership Team
If you have a concern or an idea for UBC that you’d like to share with someone that is not on staff, feel free to contact one of our leadership team members.
Chair: Kerri Fisher: Kerri_Fisher@baylor.edu
Luci Hoppe: lhoppe@gmail.com
Jeremy Nance: Jeremy.J.Nance@L3T.com
Joanna Sowards: jo.sowards@gmail.com
Kathy Krey: kathykrey@gmail.com
Jose Zuniga: jzgrphix2002@yahoo.com
Taylor Torregrossa: Taylordtorregrossa@gmail.com
Student Position: Davis Misloski
Student Position: Maddy O’Shaughnessy
UBC Finance Team
Do you have a question about UBC’s financial affairs? Please feel free to contact any of your finance team members.
Catherine Ballas: catherine@refitrev.com
Jen Carron: jen.carron78@gmail.com
Mike Dodson: financeteammike@gmail.com
George Thornton: GeorgecCT1982@gmail.com
UBC HR Team
If you have concerns about staff and would like contact our human resources team, please feel free to email any of the following members.
Erin Albin: erin.albin1@gmail.com
Sam Goff: samuelgoff92@gmail.com
Rebekah Powell: rpowell671@gmail.com
Kristen Richardson: wacorichardsons@gmail.com
Craig Nash: Craig_Nash@baylor.edu