Sunday Morning Adult Education at St. John the Divine

Dr. Kira Moolman Pettit and The Rev. Sutton Lowe discuss how Anna is unique in all the stories that we’ve shared this Advent. She is called a prophetess and, yet, none of her words are recorded directly in Scripture. This doesn’t mean that her prophetic voice is unheard. It means that her ordinary faithfulness of going to the temple to worship and to be with the people of God year after year, decade after decade was an act of bearing witness to who God is. This widow of many years continued to be be a part the faithful community and her reward was an unexpected encounter with an unlikely savior, Jesus. Her story means that we do not have to have visitations from angels or words spoken directly by the Holy Spirit to find Jesus. He comes to us in the most ordinary of ways.

Dr. Kira Moolman Pettit and The Rev. Sutton Lowe jump ahead in time to show how the waiting of Advent carries forward through all the season of life. Simeon waits, relying on a promise of the Holy Spirit that he will not die before he sees Israel's savior. When he sees the infant Jesus brought into the temple the Holy Spirit moves him to sing and praise God. Kira and Sutton discover that the main actor in all of these Advent stories is the Holy Spirit, who is also the main actor in our lives as well.

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