ADVENT RESOURCES 2017
Print-ready resources for worship & reflection
Using texts from the Revised Common Lectionary, the resources include:
- Weekly bulletins with liturgy and prayers in both black & white and full color versions
- Weekly images to color
- Prompts for exploring poetry as a spiritual practice
- Special music, Listen in the Silence, shared with permission of Linnea Good (sheet music / with accompaniment / mp3)
- Contemplative videos for each week featuring Listen in the Silence sung by Linnea Good
The resources are ideal for individuals, families, small groups, Sunday School classes, or for use in a multi-generational setting involving the entire congregation.
These resources were created by LEAD featuring liturgies by Lynn Willis, Spiritual Director, and original art by Vonda Drees, Director of the Grunewald Guild. Thank you also to singer/songwriter Linnea Good for granting us permission to use and share her song, Listen in the Silence (sheet music / with accompaniment / mp3).
Resources from previous years are also available:
Advent Resources 2017 Week 1
Advent Resources 2017 Week 2
Advent Resources 2017 Week 3
Advent Resources 2017 Week 4
Advent Resources 2017 Week 5
Advent Resources 2017 Week 6
About the liturgies
Four contemplative Advent liturgies introducing poetry as a spiritual practice (optional) and accompanying coloring pages in a variety of formats. Each weekly liturgy, created by Lynn Willis, includes the following:
- Invocation
- Confession
- Scripture
- Prayer
- Time to be still (including options for guided poetry creation and / or coloring*)
- Blessing
This year the focus is on quieting and silencing in order to listen for God’s voice.
We invite you to consider beginning Advent Week 1 with all 4 Advent candles and the Christ candle lit, extinguishing one candle each week as a visual representation of this centering and the call to listen only for God-with-us: Emmanuel.
*Explore coloring as a spiritual practice.
How to use?
Congregations
- As part of Sunday worship during Advent
- For special mid-week Advent services
- Worshipers can be invited to create short poems and / or color the black and white images during a period of quiet reflection
Individuals
- As personal devotions during Advent
- Daily prayer and poetry creation
- Coloring the black and white versions provides time to reflect on the messages
Creative ideas that others have shared
- A coloring table in the entryway for kids and adults
- With confirmation students for devotion time
- During a 3-hour silent retreat
- In prison ministry settings
- Small group bible study at a local restaurant
- Conference clergy meeting
- Coloring pages provided as take-home resources
- For an ecumenical bible study
- At a local senior residence
- Combined into a devotional booklet
- Images enlarged as posters for group, collaborative coloring or hung as banners
- Blessings sent out in weekly emails and posted on Facebook
LITURGIES – PRINT READY BULLETINS
Each 2-page weekly bulletin includes an invitation to reflect in several different ways:
- by using weekly prompts to create short poems
- by coloring the bulletin images
Three different versions of each bulletin are available in both PDF and Publisher formats:
- black & white – may be colored during worship or at a later time
- color – includes both a full color image and a black & white image to be colored
This year the focus is on quieting and silencing in order to listen for God’s voice. Special music, Listen in the Silence, shared with permission of singer / songwriter, Linnea Good (sheet music / with accompaniment / mp3).
We invite you to consider beginning Advent Week 1 with all 4 Advent candles and the Christ candle lit. Each week, one candle will be extinguished as a visual representation of this centering and the call to listen only for God-with-us: Emmanuel. There is a brief paragraph at the beginning of each bulletin that explains this process. If you choose not to do this, you may simply delete the “Before we begin” section of the bulletin.
You are welcome to customize the resources or to use pieces of them to fit your own context, however we ask that you credit WayToLead.org and GrunewaldGuild.com.
IMAGES
Note: While the vertical images do not appear to be the same height on this page, when copied or saved the individual pieces will be the same height and can be fit together into a collage of the full image.
If you will be lighting all 4 candles and the Christ candle for Week 1, begin by attaching the Week 1 panel to the right hand side of the page and end with Week 4 – Christmas Eve on the left. Note: there are 2 images for Week 4 as it is both the 4th Sunday in Advent and Christmas Eve.
There are both png and jpg links below each image. For a low resolution version:
- Click on the image itself.
- When the image is on your screen, right click on it to bring up the options.
Printable PDF versions suitable for individual coloring: 11×8.5 / 17×11
