God is about to do something in your life!
It doesn’t matter if you are 7 years old or 77 years old - God is about to do something in your life.
Whether you come to church only occasionally or every week - God is about to do something in your life. Perhaps you are a mom or a dad, busy with a thousand things to do and 10,000 things to worry about; perhaps you are a youngster in the third grade; you might be a middle school or high school student; maybe you’re retired; perhaps you live alone; you might be a young single adult; you might be happy or sad, tired or rested; perhaps you are engaged to be married or you may have been recently widowed; perhaps you are separated or divorced; you might be a single parent; maybe you have forgotten about God, or you might think that God has forgotten about you: whoever you are, God is about to do something in your life.
Do you have an idea, a thought, a notion of how God might want to touch your life this Ash Wednesday and in the forty days of Lent that follow?
Don’t doubt for a moment that God waits to touch your heart in the holy season ahead of us. As a matter of fact, not any day goes by without the Lord reaching out to touch us, to speak to us, to forgive us, to heal us, to comfort and challenge us. Lent is a time when we make an extra effort, for 40 days, to listen for God’s word, to ask for his mercy, to open ourselves to his healing touch, and to invite the Lord to enter more deeply into our hearts and lives. At least for a season, we make a special effort to be open to God - and you can be sure that God is ready to take advantage of our seasonal readiness!
Just what IS Lent, anyway?
LENT is a season to do some spring-cleaning in the many rooms of our hearts to ready them for celebrating God’s gift of new life at Easter.
LENT is a season to prepare for Easter by: prayer (with the church and by myself); fasting (learning to hunger for God); and almsgiving (caring for the poor)
LENT is a time for getting back to basics: to learn again and to practice for forty days how we should live as Christians every day of the year.
LENT is a time for coming home: coming home to the Church community; coming home to prayer; coming home to God.
LENT is spring training for Christians: a time to get in shape, spiritually; a time to strengthen what is weak within us and tone up the strengths we have.
LENT is a time to make the time to begin to really do the things we say we want and hope to do - but just never seem to have the time to get around to...
LENT is a time for getting ready to celebrate EASTER ! Easter is at the heart of our life as Christians and Lent is the way to prepare for Easter joy!
-ConcordPastor
I have found that, even if I don't chose a Lenten program to follow, Lent has a way of providing me with one. 23 long years ago that program was, after having stopped drinking but before I got into a recovery program, to fall sufficiently apart that I could be brought to a place where I could no longer deny that I needed help.
ReplyDeleteThis year, Lent coincides with the beginning of my working with my discernment committee, as I continue with my work of discerning and clarifying my call to the Vocational Diaconate in the Episcopal Church. I suspect that the members of my committee will find that Lent encourages them to ask me the questions I'd rather avoid but which most need to be asked. I'm not sure what those questions are, but by the end of Lent I suspect I will know!
Hey, Piskie!
ReplyDeleteYou are definitely not "just another" piskie - you're a great one - at least I've discerned that - and hope your committee does the same. You're in my prayers in this process.
Thanks, old friend. Prayers are good. ;-) I can remember when I so resented the Lenten package "To Live for a Season," but that's really what Lent is all about. Try it on, intentionally, for forty days, and who knows what will stick beyond Easter -- for years or even decades. Volunteer for transformation, that's the invitation of Lent.
ReplyDelete