Advent candles provide warmth for the body and soul

The Christmas season is a time of togetherness, family gatherings, and the simple warmth of advent candles. In a season in which the landscape is coated in snow and the air chills you to the core, advent candles give off a sweet glow that can warm your whole body and fill you with cheer in one quick glance. It’s a tradition that children cherish and pass on to their own children later in life, and it’s an activity that signifies the pure message of Christmas in a few small flames.

On the way to the church, your boots crunch the snow down into tiny compacted layers of ice. Your nose slowly freezes to a rosy glow of its own, your cheeks become mirrors of the candied apples you made earlier in the day with your children. All around you, windows are lit by single battery operated candles while the houses are dark as their inhabitants also make the trek to the church to see the advent candle lit.

The advent candle wreath sits at the front of the church, perhaps on the altar, perhaps next to the altar. As the weeks move on toward Christmas, the church will be filled with candle scents immediately when you enter, but this week is the first week in advent. You look at the wreath, at the eternity its circular shape signifies, and think about Christmas. The green so perfectly offsets the simple advent candles, and you look at the accenting holly and think about their symbolism – the holly that reminds you of Christ’s crown of thorns and the berries that symbolize his blood.

As the acolyte walks the aisle to the advent candle wreath, you look at your family and friends and feel the warmth of the church air, see how their cheeks still hold the red cheer of the cool snowy air, and how their eyes still dance with the twinkle of the battery operated lights you passed on the way to the church. You watch as the advent candle is lit, signifying the first week in the anticipation of the Christmas holiday. You feel the warmth of the flame from the advent candle, and you inhale the candle scents mixed with the scents of evergreen and holly.

While all advent candles will be lit for weeks to come, you feel the Christmas spirit immediately upon the lighting of that first advent candle. You feel it in your heart, and you see it in those around you. Christmas is coming.