Welcome to Life Church. We're so glad you're here.

This month, we're diving into the Christmas tradition of Advent, what it is and how it helps us connect with the true meaning of Christmas.

And speaking of Christmas, we'd love for you to celebrate with us at Life Church.

You can find service times and get a sneak peek of what you'll experience at life.church slash celebrate Christmas.

Now, here's this week's message.

We're starting a message series on Advent. How many of you know a lot about Advent? Raise your

hand. A lot about Advent online. You can say I know a lot about Advent or you can say I don't know

a lot about Advent. When I can say I don't know a lot about Advent.

When I was a kid, I had an Advent calendar. I didn't know anything about Advent, but I had an

Advent calendar, and it had what I called Flippy Flaps. I'm sure there's a real name for it, but I

called it Flippy Flaps. On like December the 1st, there's a little flippy flap you could open up, and there's a really

cool picture on that date.

Then on December 2nd, you could open it the Flippy Flap, and there's a really cool picture

there.

I was so excited every single day.

This was like 1975 version of TikTok dopamine anticipation.

Flippy flaps. I didn't know what Advent was, but I had a calendar with Flippy Flaps. You may not know a lot about Advent, but you may have had an Advent Reef, or you may have had a calendar, or you may even

have some candles. And it's interesting, there's a lot of Advent stuff around the church, but a lot

of Christians still don't know what Advent really means. So we're going to talk about it for the next

four weeks. To start with the foundational understanding, Advent comes from the Latin word Adventist,

which means coming or arrival. It's about focusing on the coming or the arrival of Jesus to earth.

And Advent traces back to the early church all the way back to the fourth century when Christians would

...