Advent 2 Peace

I've always thought it a little ironic that, just as the Christmas season gathers momentum and we get busy with present-buying and food shopping and calendar-juggling and work deadlines, we are invited, perhaps challenged, to focus on Peace. For many people, Christmas is not a particularly 'peaceful' time – fun, certainly, but hardly peaceful as we manage children, end-of-year break-ups, family gatherings, traffic, over-eating, and everything else. All that in the context of a wider world riven, in so many places and dimensions, by war and conflict: it may feel quite incongruous to be announcing peace in this Advent season. In this second week in Advent, we focus on Peace – shalom– turning our minds and hearts towards claiming that deep serenity, harmony, wholeness that will be one outworking of the Spirit of God within us. Background music in this podcast is by E's Jammy Jams.