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Wednesday's Word:  A Season of Deliverance

2/27/2013

 
While visiting another church this past Sunday, the worship leader called Lent a season of "devotion, discipline and deliverance." 

Her words gave me pause.  In what way can we find deliverance in our denial of pleasurable passtimes or food?  Won't God still deliver me if I eat chocolate or watch television?

As I've been turning over these words the past few days, I've come to understand that deliverance is not a once in a lifetime event. As frail human creatures, we are constantly hurt, vulnerable and wounded.  We create mechanisms to cope with the cruelties of this world, many of which shield us from love, acceptance and healing. 

Lent gives us an opportunity to be vulnerable before the One who kept nothing from us. We give Him our devotion and our discipline, not in order to receive a some cosmic return at a teller's window, but to open ourselves to His heart.  We give ourselves time to heal, space to know Him and deliverance from all that has weighed us down. 

Devotion:  We plant ourselves in Him.  Discipline:  We water our parched souls. Deliverance: We grow into the beautiful ones we were created to be.

Happy Lent.
Picture
Beauty from my sister-in-law's garden.

A Gentle Season

2/20/2013

 
While visiting an Episcopal church this week, the priest urged the congregation to remember the gentleness of Lent.

This was a new concept to me. I confess that my memories of Lent, colored by parochial school, are far from "gentle." We were marched into chapel each Friday and seated with older students (ostensibly to encourage us to listen more carefully) to observe the stations of the cross.  I remember boredom; I remember standing and kneeling for what seemed like hours.  I remember dreading Friday afternoons and the loss of chocolate for 40 days.  I do not remember gentleness.

I confess that I am apt to become enamored with the kinder, gentler view of Lent:  this is the view that teaches us to be introspective and contemplative.  This is the view that values silence and prayer. This is the view that encourages quality of relationship over quantity of religious practice.

May we all enjoy the gentleness of God and each other this Lenten season.





 
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