A Message from Pastor Andrea Chaumont

November 27, 2025

Happy Thanksgiving, Mt. Baker Park Church! This Thanksgiving, I am thankful for each one of you. It’s time to get up those Christmas trees, pull out the candles and lights and start preparing for Christmas, but in between we have a very intentional season in our church calendar, Advent.

According to Kate Bowler (Professor of Religious History at Duke University), “Advent is a season of expectancy and preparation - and, perhaps surprisingly, the beginning of the Christian calendar. In the church, the year doesn’t start with ‘New Year, New Me,’ but with the hopeful anticipation of a baby who will come to make all things new. It always ends on December 24, and then Christmas begins and lasts until January 6.” As I mentioned last week, I love Advent, partially because it allows us space to acknowledge the full range of our humanity (it’s not all deck the halls and let’s be merry, is it?). Again from Kate Bowler, Advent is a space to "sit with the messiness of life while still holding on to the promise of what's to come.”

I am thankful that we worship a God who makes room for mess, who entered into our mess in a human body and came close to disease, suffering and isolation. God makes beloved community in a broken world. I look forward to being back in worship with you Sunday, joined by the Rev. Erin Grayson, a kind and wise pastor and friend who will preach on Matthew 24:35-44, When God Shows Up.      

Thanksgiving Blessings,

Pastor Andrea