Introduction

Someone once said to me that what they appreciate about books like this, and the one before it, In Love with the Life of Life, is all the different voices. Reading collections like this, they told me, helped them to feel part of ‘a little community of hope’.

In The Adventure Is Beginning, Leader of the Iona Community, Ruth Harvey, writes:

‘The first two verses of Isaiah’s prophecy speak of a people beckoning their God, who they know will turn the world upside down. And so we join our voice with the voices of others, welcoming, willing, wooing the arrival of a God who will overturn injustice and will midwife the birth of a new world order …’

I hope that reading this book helps you to feel part of a community of hope – in 2020-2021 we need hope – and I hope that it challenges you to pray and work for a world turned upside down, for the birth of a new world order. One where we, in the West, learn to live with less and climate change is halted, where refugees and asylum seekers are welcomed and cherished, where poverty is made history ...

Thank you so much for all that you do in your community and in the community of the world. We are all sparks of the Light. Let’s keep on encouraging and inspiring each other.

To root this book and give writers a discipline, the Bible readings are based on the Revised Common Lectionary, Year B. The Bible readings don’t follow the lectionary strictly though: folk were asked to choose a few verses from one reading in the lectionary. While the Bible readings connect to the lectionary for 2020/2021, this book may be used during Advent and Christmas in any year. However if you want to read it in connection with the Revised Common Lectionary, there are four additional daily readings in the Appendix which allow for the book to be used every third year, when the readings fall in Year B.

Reflecting a diverse community of hope, there’s a good range of different writing styles here: biblical exegesis, personal reflection, meditations, poetry, prayer …

Thanks so much to everyone who contributed to The Adventure Is Beginning. It was a privilege to be entrusted with your writing.

Thanks to writer/editor/friend Ruth Burgess for her ability to get inside lectionaries, and for calmly being there.

‘Advent stories tell us: “Get ready!” – for something hugely momentous is about to happen. “Prepare yourself!”, because after this nothing will ever be the same again …’ (Ruth Harvey)

And so, with Christmas and a New Year just up ahead, let’s prepare by saying this beautiful prayer together:

Give us the courage to follow your light along the road of compassion, of peace, of community, so that we can become the people you created us to be. God says: ‘Here I am – knocking on your door.’ The door opens – the New Year is ahead – the adventure is beginning.

(Isabel Whyte)

– Neil Paynter, early October, Biggar, Scotland