Here is a piece I wrote six years ago that I want to resend to everyone.

Be His

R+

 

Why Lent?

 

After pastoring this congregation for eight plus years (fourteen now), I have come to realize that there are quite a few of us that just don't get Lent and for that matter just don't get the various seasons and feast days, i.e. Pentecost, All Saints, Advent, and Epiphany and so on that we observe through out the year. These days and seasons set up within the organized church seem for some to miss the mark in having meaning in their spiritual journey with Christ. I have heard some say, "I thought Christ's death and resurrection and ascension dissolved all of the feast and festivals of old?" Or, why do we need to set up another system that on the surface appears shallow and lacks any real significance to following Jesus?

 

 I did some recent reading to see if I could come up with some fresh insight to help all of our non-liturgical fellow disciples. Let me first say that within this journey of following Jesus there are many helpful disciplines and observing the feast and seasons of the church year are just a few. With that said onto 'Why Lent'.

 

One of the points of Lent is to observe, as a part of our personal piety, a season of repentance and reflection in preparation for a glorious celebration of Easter. This supports the familiar saying that there is no Easter without a Good Friday. The forty days of Lent can be a precious preparation time which makes Easter so much more meaningful. I read of a tradition kept by the Hassidic Jews, that each man must have two pockets in his coat. In one pocket he should have a slip of paper that says "I am but dust, and to dust I shall return". In the other pocket, a slip that says, "God created the whole universe for me". This is the paradox of living as fallen creation in the midst of a fallen world created by a sovereign God, who created everything for us.

 

Thus, Why Lent, can be answered for now by saying this yearly discipline helps us grasp the two truths about who we are, so that we can begin to fathom a holy and righteous, yet merciful and loving Father, and respond to Him in love and obedience. It can also lead us to a better comprehension of the paradox of being a "ruined self" and still be a "trophy of grace".

 

In my reading, I came across the following prayer taken from a collection of Puritan Prayers.

 

Thou blessed Spirit, Author of all grace and comfort, 
Come, work repentance in my soul; 
Represent sin to me in its odious colors 
that I may hate it, 
...Show me my ruined self 
and the help there is in Thee;... 
May I confide in His power and love, 
commit my soul to Him without reserve 
bear His image, observe His laws, pursue His service, 
and be through time and eternity 
a monument to the efficacy of His grace 
a trophy of His victory

~Valley of Vision

 

 

I invite you, therefore, in the name of the Church, to the observance of a holy Lent, by self-examination and repentance; by prayer, fasting, and self-denial; and by reading and meditating on God's holy Word.  (From the Ash Wednesday Liturgy)

 

 

Ash Wednesday Services will be held at Church of the Apostles at noon and 6:00 pm.

 

Grace and peace to you all

Robert+

 

"Come help us bury the Alleluia banner the children made at church last Sunday....we will do it tomorrow, Ash Wednesday, before the COTA service, around 5:30...the service starts at 6:00. For those not familiar with this tradition, this is our symbolic gesture toward burying our "alleluias" and then we "dig it up" Easter morning." 
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