At Home In Advent

The following words for reflection are taken and adapted from “At Home In Advent - A domestic journey from Advent to Epiphany” from Gordon Giles (BRF - Bible Reading Fellowship). The entire book is available from Eden.co.uk and would be recommended to get a fuller experience of this time of devotion and meditation.

The purpose of these devotional is to give you something of an everyday object or motion which can focus our thinking through Advent. There are 3 sections:

Travelling in Advent
At Home in Advent
The run up to Christmas

This is a journey…

Burglar Alarm: Digital Armour

Read: 1 Thessalonians 5:2 - 11

Think back a few years, not too many, and words like ‘online fraud’, ‘hacked account’ and ‘email scam’ would’ve sounded foreign and rare. However in today’s world of cybercrime there are commonplace. Maybe you have been a victim of one of these crimes?

What happened to good old fashion break-ins to take my things? At least then I could see a broken window! Now it could be days or even weeks before we discover stolen funds or harm caused.

To help our homes we can install alarms and facilities to deter those up to no good. On our computers we install software to help. We listen to campaigns like Scamwise to prevent more of these unseen activities. We want protection from the unknown and the unseen.

However we are given this strange ‘negative’ picture of the return of Christ. He will return as a thief in the night! What does that mean?

Simply put… we have no idea when he will come, but he will come and we may not be prepared for it. If we are willing to put thought and energy into protecting ourselves physically, even technologically, why don’t we put as much time into our Spiritual assurances? Surely this could be a time to prepare for the coming Christ and approach HIm with confidence…

Do you take personal security (at home or online) seriously?

Have you ever been a victim of a cyber attack (theft, virus etc)? Which felt worse, the loss of money or the loss of security?

Take time to pray for those who don’t feel secure in whatever way.