Christmas is just around the corner now friends, and for this final of Sunday of Advent, we are inviting everyone to bring some kind of “sweet” finger food for after the service. It should be a fun and meaningful morning. Also, don’t forget about our Christmas Eve service at 4pm at St. Andrew's. We would love to see you all as we welcome in Christmas together. I don’t want to get too far ahead of myself though as we are still in the season of Advent. Advent is often described as a season of waiting, but what if the real question isn’t whether we’re waiting, but where we’re waiting? This week, I want to listen closely to Mary’s song and her unsettling claim that God looks with favour on the lowly. Not the impressive. Not the powerful. The lowly. As we trace Mary’s story and song, we’ll explore why God so often seems to meet people not at their strongest, but at their most exposed, and why that truth is both comforting and deeply disrupts the stories we tell about ourselves.

Friends, this week we’re stepping into the Advent story through the eyes of Mary, a teenager in a nowhere town suddenly asked to carry God into the world. It’s a beautiful scene, until you remember it was also terrifying, disruptive, and about as far from “silent night” as you can get. And apparently, the church has always struggled with this story (so at least we are in good company). In fact, a few hundred years after the fact, church leaders tried to sort out what Mary’s “yes” actually meant. And, well, let’s just say it did not go smoothly. Picture a theological debate that somehow drifted into something resembling an ancient fist fight or an episode of Jerry Springer. Yes, really, it was that bad. Christians have never needed much help making things weird. But underneath the chaos of the story is a question Advent keeps putting in front of us: What does it mean for ordinary people to carry something of God into the world? What does Mary show us about fear, vulnerability, and how the smallest “yes” can reshape a life? We’ll sit with the mystery this Sunday, and laugh a little at our own species, while trying to see where this story might be trying to nudge us next.

This week, we’re setting aside our typical rhythms at Nexus for a Looking Glass Sunday—a morning to pause and notice our ancestors of faith. We want to use this Sunday morning to reflect on the ones who steadied us, surprised us, encouraged us, nudged us toward grace, or simply showed us what a faithful life can look like in the ordinary and unpolished places. We’ll hear from a handful of our own community members as they share brief reflections on the people—known or unknown to us—who left fingerprints on their faith in life-giving ways. Along the way, we’ll be invited to hold up the mirror ourselves, to wonder who helped make us who we are today… and maybe even what kind of presence we’re becoming for someone else. It’ll be reflective, grounding, and maybe even quietly hopeful. So, listen in as we look back to see forward a little more clearly.