The Season of Advent

The Season of Advent @ Fauntleroy Church, UCC

12/1 Worship 10AM*, First Sunday of Advent, “You are a Blessing”. Scripture: Luke 1:26-38, Isaiah 43:1-7. We light the candle of hope.

12/1 Youth Group, 5-7:30PM – A fun gathering for youth in middle & high school.

12/8 10AM Worship*, Second Sunday of Advent, Children's Christmas Pageant Worship, “Gathering Fire”. All ages enjoy worship. We light the candle of peace.

12/8 Advent Festival & Stone Soup – Gather in Fellowship Hall after worship for intergenerational fun, soup, & crafts to make for yourself or to give as gifts.

12/15 Worship 10AM*, Third Sunday of Advent, “Do the Good that is Yours to Do”. Scripture: Luke 3:7-16, Isaiah 58: 9b-12. We light the candle of joy.

12/21 Welcome Table – Volunteers provide lunch and other basic resources to our food insecure neighbors and friends once a month in White Center

12/21 Christmas Concert, 7PM – The Festival of Trees opens at 6PM.

12/22 Christmas Concert, 4PM – The Festival of Trees opens at 3PM. Reception to follow in Fellowship Hall.

12/15 Youth Group, 5-9PM – Progressive Christmas dinner and White Elephant gift exchange for youth in middle & high school. RSVPs needed by 12/8.

12/22 Worship 10AM*, Fourth Sunday of Advent, “Hope is Worth the Risk”. Scripture: Matthew 1: 18-25, Luke 1: 45-55. We light the candle of love.  

12/24 Christmas Eve – Three Evening Services:

• 4PM – A shorter, interactive service offered for all, but especially with the energy and joy of families and young children in mind. We'll end singing “Happy Birthday” to the Christ Child. Then, all are welcome to enjoy birthday cake at the reception that follows in Fellowship Hall.

• 7PM* – A worship with the traditional Christmas readings and carols. Worship ends with beautiful candlelight.

• 11PM – A more contemplative worship with communion. We’ll end with candlelight and singing Silent Night.

12/29 Worship 10AM*, First Sunday of Christmas, “Light of the World!” Scripture: Matthew 2:10. This is a “Festival Sunday” for all ages. We’ll shorten our worship time in the sanctuary (and online), head to Fellowship Hall, and engage in creative conversation about what is bringing light to our world.

1/5/2025 Worship 10AM*, First Sunday of Epiphany (our “star word” service), Scripture: Matthew 2:1-11, Come and hear reflections shared by our members and receive a word to guide you through 2025.

1/5/2025 Take Down Decorations – Stay after worship to help us lovingly box up our Advent and Christmas decorations for next year. We can use your help!

* = Offered in-person and live streamed on YouTube

The Season of Advent

Join us for the season of Advent at Fauntleroy Church

“How Does a Weary World Rejoice?” is our theme for Advent, drawn from the Christmas song, “O, Holy Night," a song that’s power lies not only in the tidal movements of the music, but in its acknowledgement of hardship and the rejoicing that can rise in its midst anyway. As the song builds, we hear …"a thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices, for yonder breaks a new and glorious morn!” This Advent, we invite you to turn toward Christmas not by turning away from your weariness or the weariness of the world, but by acknowledging it and then exploring where the crescendos of life’s music might be found. Together, we’ll talk about connection, amazement and awe, stories of hope and ritual as elements that can help us and our world find lift and resolution in the hands of the Divine.

The schedule of worship services, events, concerts, and opportunities for service and fellowship is found below. For more details about the season, click here.

Our Festival of Trees is Growing!

Fellowship Hall has been transformed! The festive Winter Wonderland is a sight to behold! From A Starry Night to Frosty & Friends to a Peruvian Christmas, the trees in our holiday forest are all unique creations that will amaze and delight. There is even an Idolitree!

LET THE COMPETITION BEGIN!

One of the primary goals of this event is to collect items for our food banks in West Seattle and White Center. Start gathering non-perishable items and vote for your favorite trees. In this election, voting multiple times and for multiple trees is encouraged! We checked with the food banks. Of course, all types of non-perishable food items are welcome, but there is a special need for healthier options and ones for those with special dietary needs, for example – low fat, low salt, gluten free, etc. Also needed are easy and healthy snacks for kids.

COMMUNITY OPEN HOUSES: Wednesday evenings - Dec 7, 14 and 21 from 7-8 pm Please help spread the word throughout the community. The more visitors, the more items for the food banks.

AFTER WORSHIP SERVICES: Join us for Coffee Hour in the Fellowship Hall on Sundays – Dec 4, 11 and 18. Stack your “votes” around your favorite trees.

VOLUNTEER: Hosts for the Open House evenings and cookie bakers are still needed. Parish Life Ministry is coordinating these efforts.

It’s Advent at Fauntleroy Church!

The outside church Christmas lights are up, our halls are decked, the giving tree stands ready to have tags taken as it’s undecked, our home-grown devotionals have found their way into many hands already, our children are preparing for the pageant, our choirs are filling practices with Christmas music, and a small forest of themed trees is growing in Fellowship Hall. It’s beginning to look and sound a lot like Christmas at Fauntleroy Church!  

Advent begins this Sunday, December 27 with communion served during worship. As we make our Advent journey together, you’ll notice that we are taking what feels a tree-lined path to Christmas. That’s intentional! “Under the Tree” is our 2022 Advent theme, and immersed in it, we’ll encounter Biblical stories and passages in which perspective is gained and the indwelling presence of God felt under the boughs of trees.  

You may know that the tradition of having a Christmas tree only goes back about 500 years. But long before that, Ancient Romans were known to mark the winter solstice by decorating their homes with evergreen boughs – symbols of hope and life in a cold and dormant season. Even longer before that, humans found meaning and glimpses of the Divine in the presence of trees.  

I have a Bible in which all the passages about nature are highlighted in green. Much like the more popular red-letter Bible that highlights Jesus’ spoken words (as presented by each Gospel writer), a green Bible draws one’s attention to just how much life and faith has intertwined with nature in the experiences of many. One of the things I’ve learned in reading this “green-letter” Bible is that references to trees abound in scripture. There are cedars and spruce, fig trees, oaks, olive trees, acacia, almond, apple, pine, pistachio, willow and more. Hundreds of references to trees can be found in the Hebrew scriptures and New Testament! Reinforcing the importance of their presence are bookend references to the tree of life in the first verses of Genesis and the last verses of Revelation – its boughs hanging over the garden of Eden as life begins, and as our scriptures end, its boughs stretching to both sides of the river of the water of life, flowing from the throne of God. Under the canopy of both these trees of life, the story of our faith unfolds and deepens. 

This Advent, as we prepare for Jesus and God’s love to be born in the world anew, some of the trees under which we’ll find ourselves include the oak of Mamre, as Abraham and Sarah entertain angels unaware. Then, we’ll nod toward the hope-bringing oaks of righteousness in Isaiah 61 (a common Advent passage) as we enjoy our children’s pageant, “Under the Tree.” Next, we’ll meet Jesus and Zaccheus under the sycamore tree of Jericho as joy in that encounter prompts Zaccheus to embrace the world and life in radically different ways. As we near Christmas, we’ll draw near to the tree of life and a vision in Revelation of the world dwelling in wholeness and peace under the canopy of God’s healing, nourishing love. Though we’re taking this different, tree-lined path toward Christmas this year, the messages of the season will be found in the shade of rich boughs overhead, carols, candles and one another before finally, we emerge on the doorstep of the traditional Christmas story on Christmas Eve.    

We hope you’ll meet us under some tree boughs in worship this Advent. There together, I trust we’ll find some of the most meaningful presents of Christmas: welcome, good news, joy, shared life and the indwelling love of God!  

With hope, 

Pastor Leah 

Fauntleroy's Festival of Trees

One of my favorite times of year at my last church was November -- when tree-by-tree-by-tree, a forest of themed Christmas trees would come alive inside the church building, made possible by the creativity, joy, and wonder (with a smidge of competitiveness) of a congregation that loved to make one another smile. This year, with our approaching Advent theme of "Under the Tree," it felt a wonderful thing to attempt at Fauntleroy Church -- so, we're going for it!

Individuals, church groups, community groups, groups of friends, families, all are invited to make a fun, themed tree come alive inside our church building! What do I mean by "themed?" Well, it could be something as simple as a tree you title "the purple tree," then decorating it with all purple lights and ornaments. Or, you could do something a bit more complicated, such as...
● a superhero tree with Marvel and D.C. Comic ornaments and maybe a cape,
● a hymn pun tree where all the simple handmade ornaments are puns on hymns ● a star tree, with all star ornaments
● a pride flag tree
● a flower tree with nothing but flowers to decorate it
● a "trigonomeTREE" for the math enthusiasts among us

None of those ideas are taken, by the way, but ideas abound on the internet and in your creative minds, I'm sure! To prompt your creative juices flowing, we're making this a competition to benefit our local food banks, as people vote for their favorite trees by placing non-perishable food items "under the tree." With the help of our Parish Life Ministry and others, we'll invite the community to come at specific times, enjoy some cookies, maybe an ornament scavenger hunt for kids, some background Christmas music and vote with their food bank donations too! Your help in spreading the word for both participation and visiting our Festival of Trees in December is appreciated. We'll announce specific times at which the church will be open outside Sunday mornings for December/Advent tree enjoyment, but first things frist: WE NEED TREE SUBMISSIONS. So, if you'd like to participate, here's the form you need to complete with instructions on what you need to do. A big thanks to new member, Shirley Asmussen, who is helping to coordinate! Please note that you do need to have or borrow an artificial tree for this event. If you happen to have an artificial tree not doing anything this year and would be happy for someone else to use it, let us know that too!

Fa-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la,
Pastor Leah