Our Lenten Journey continues…
I wonder what you’ve experienced in this time of reflection so far this year. As you’ve been reflecting on the season, reading the bible, praying and seeking new insight from God. What has He been saying to you? How do you sense God’s guidance along the pilgrim-journey?
This Sunday (Lent 5) sees the start of Passiontide. This week may well provide another chance to reflect on the “great themes of redemption; incarnation, suffering, death, resurrection, glorification”. 1
Next Sunday (Palm Sunday) we enter Holy Week and follow Jesus’ journey to death on the cross.
Over these next two weeks we’ll have a chance to participate in a whole sequence of services. Holy Week gives us the chance to participate in Jesus’ journey. His “triumphal entry” into Jerusalem. Maundy Thursday confronts us with Jesus, the servant king, washing the disciples’ feet and the institution of the eucharist [Do join us in Winchester Cathedral on Maundy Thursday at the Chrism Eucharist; a very special service]. Good Friday brings opportunity to reflect through meditation and publicly witness our faith at walks or gatherings in the locality. And then we gather on Easter Sunday to celebrate God’s act of raising Jesus from the dead.
In the meantime, how are you, how are we, going to engage in our pilgrimage journey in these two remaining Lenten weeks? Jesus’ first disciples were on a journey as well. We have the “benefit” of knowing how things developed in Jesus’ ministry. We have the Bible, which gives us a record of God’s work and how Jesus was the turning point giving opportunity for everyone to know God through Jesus. We also have a developed theology, a liturgical year with seasons unfolding to help us navigate our spiritual journey.
One disadvantage of our experience and, to some extent, our western culture is that it’s easy to anticipate the end of the Lenten journey and skip straight on to the joy of Easter. In our Lenten journey it’s important to try to stay in the moment reflecting more deeply in Passiontide on Jesus’ journey and on what God has done through Him. These next two weeks offer time to reflect, joining with others when we can, in seeking God’s Word for our lives.
Let us try to give space to reflect, pray and experience the fullness of what God has for us in this remaining time of Lent taking one day at a time. What is He saying to you, to me, to the church? Let us try to listen carefully…
And as we enter the Season of Passiontide, here’s a thought on faith, once again from Richard Rohr…
Revd Dave Mapes
1 Common Worship; Times and Seasons (2006), Church House Publishing, London.
The Attitude of Faith
Unless we can presume that the Lord is speaking right now, how can we believe that he ever spoke? This is the premise on which we’re proceeding: that the Lord is acting and speaking in our lives right now.
To have an attitude of faith is to hear the Lord speaking everywhere and all the time, in the concrete and ordinary circumstances of our lives. Then religion and life have become one, and we are never far from God. That’s why people of faith never grow old and never grow tired. They don’t need signs and wonders, apparitions and visions. God has quietly broken through and stands perfectly revealed in the now of things.
From The Great Themes of Scripture – Richard Rohr
Sunday of the Fifth Week in Lent (Day 143)
Radical Grace: Daily Meditations. St. Anthony Messenger Press, Cincinnati Ohio, 1995