Monday Morning Offering - 38

Image: George Mendoza

For nine months I've been posting a weekly Monday Morning Offering, a feature on my blog which draws many readers. So, with the hope that those who have come here for the daily Lenten prayer series might continue to return on Mondays after Easter, the regular Monday Morning Offering stands today as the Daily Lenten Prayer for Monday of the Third Week of Lent.

Good morning, good God!

North of the equator
and here in this corner of New England
dollops of snow
ice the parking lot's borders and backyard corners:
gritty, gray reminders of what has been
and what might yet return...

But yesterday, Lord, there was sunlight
warm enough to touch a forearm
bared by a rolled sleeve
exposing me to hope
that spring might yet arrive...

And last week, one day,
I opened my windows
to freshen my room and, more, my soul
grown stale through winter's lock
on all things fresh and spring...

There, I said it: spring!

At least I wrote it, Lord,
with hope that you might hear my plea,
my prayer for some sign
that you have not forgotten
the promise changing seasons bring...

Would you tease me, Lord
with sunlight and warmth
if something grand were not in the air,
on the air
and ready to appear?

As surely as I knew the barren cold
would chill the last of fall,
I've counted on your good will
to spring, to sprout,
to spruce to life my sluggish soul...

In other times you've drawn me
to hope that things would be different,
would change, would bring me peace -
but I failed to find what your signs had promised...

Let me not be fooled this spring, Lord...

Let me not be disappointed
by a winter without end...

I offer you this morning
a heart that trusts the hints of spring
you've hung from trees and sky
will make good your promise to raise me up
for a season of life renewed...

Along the path, Lord, open my eyes
to see those who fail to see
the signs of spring around them...
Strengthen me to lift up those
who need to see what you have shown...

One day at a time this Lent, Lord:
you and me, with the Church,
in the grace of your Holy Spirit...

Amen.
2009
- Heart image by Gwen Mehorg
- Coffee image by George Mendoza

-ConcordPastor