preparation - Jeremiah's Vow

Lent 2023 | Introduction: The Season of Lent

The Day before Ash Wednesday

The day before Ash Wednesday has a variety of names. It has been known as Fat Tuesday. But more commonly it is known as Mardi Gras. Most people would think of the party that takes place in New Orleans, but there is an important liturgical reality to the day preceding Ash Wednesday.

The reason for this is two-fold. The Season of Lent is a time of fasting and reflection. It is the liturgical season that precedes Easter. Through the centuries, the Church has used this time to remember how much we need Jesus. His life, death, and resurrection together serve as the climax of God’s redemptive work through him.

The day prior to Ash Wednesday was used as a way of enjoying those things that would be forsaken during the season of Lent. However, as with most things, this meaning was, in great measure has been lost, and we only remember the party. And not what the celebration was preparing us for.

The Season of Lent

As we enter into Lent, we are all called to make an evaluation of how we have been living out our faith. We are challenged over the course of six weeks to deny ourselves of some temporal good so we can increase our focus on some spiritual reality. It really isn’t about what we give up or what we add to our daily spiritual disciplines. The focus should be on intentionally drawing closer to God, even if we only participate in this level of focus for a season once a year.

As we live our lives, we can’t all adopt the lifestyles of monks and nuns. There are bills to pay, children to raise, work to do, and so many more responsibilities we have tend to. And all of these are important. They serve as the outlets through which we can show the world what God has been doing in us.

One Life to Live

When we see the activity of a spiritual life as being of a different kind than what we do in our “everyday” life, we are making a critical mistake. There should not be some distinction between our “faith life” and our “normal life”.

We only have one life.

And the better able we are to understand this, the more likely we will be to avoid artificial barriers in our lives.

This is what this series of reflections is about this year.

Let’s Focus on the Gospel

The Gospel is the most important message ever proclaimed. In it and by it, we are invited to return to what God desired for his creation—that we would live in fellowship with him. But, since the fall of humanity in the Garden of Eden, we were and have been separated from God. Therefore, God enacted a plan to redeem what was lost.

The Gospel is the hub from which we can understand all that God is doing in the world and in us.

As we look at the Gospel, each reflection will highlight one characteristic of the Gospel message. This is not intended to be an exhaustive study of the Gospel. It’s meant to be descriptive. To help us better understand that what the Gospel does is far more and far more wonderful than we may have ever fully realized.

I pray you will find these reflections edifying. If you do, I invite you to do two things.

Comment below each reflection letting me know how the thoughts challenged you or reminded you of something you already knew.
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Lent 2023 Series

God Remembers that we are Dust

God is interested in doing more than merely punishing people. … God desires for us to have a relationship with him.

I was reading this morning and Psalm 103 and I was struck by a section of the passage. It began in verse 10.

¹⁰ He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities. ¹¹ For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him; ¹² as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgression from us. ¹³ As a father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him. ¹⁴ For he knows our frame; he remembers that we are dust. … ¹⁷ But the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him, and his righteousness to children’s generation, ¹⁸ to those who keep his covenant and remember to do his commandments.
Psalm 103:10-14, 17-18 ESV

What I found interesting about this passage is the way in which the author relates God’s dealing with us is the reason for the way he deals with us. In verse 10 he says, “he does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities.” What I find interesting is that too often in the church we believe that God is punishing us because of our sin. And to some degree that’s correct, but that doesn’t tell the whole story. There is something else at work that the psalmist is trying to teach us.

God is interested in doing more than merely punishing people. A good father disciplines his children. We see that in Scripture. But there is something else that God is after as it relates to our relationship with him. And what is that? God desires for us to have a relationship with him.

God doesn’t deal with us according to our sins or iniquities because, according to verse 14, “he knows our frame, he remembers that we are dust.” God is not blind nor is he ignorant to who we are or what we are. This should not only give us comfort but it should remind us that there is something beyond our failures that God is interested in. What is that? It is our relationship with him. I want to repeat this point because I think it’s too often misunderstood or left unsaid.

One of the implications of this passage is that if we do not relate to God as he desires then there is a sense in which our sin and our iniquities and our frame and the fact that we are dust will have consequences on our lives. But if we relate to God as he desires, if we understand what is at stake and what it is that we’re supposed to be doing, then it becomes easier for us to not fear God in terror but to fear God in reverence.

Several times in the passage we see what it is that God is looking for, as a way of knowing that we understand what he is looking for.

In verse 11 we see him say that his steadfast love toward us is “toward those who fear him.”

In verse 13 it says that the Lord shows compassion “to those who fear him.”

In verse 17 the “steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him.”

And then in verse 18, we see that this everlasting love is “to those who keep his covenant and remember to do his commandments.”

What can we learn from this? I think we can learn that we tend to put expectations upon ourselves about what God desires from us and for us that may not be consistent with who he is what he has said.

I think this is a healthy reminder as we begin the new year.

Lent 2020: Shrove Tuesday

Today is Shrove Tuesday.

If you don’t know what Shrove Tuesday is, it is the day before Ash Wednesday. If you don’t know what Ash Wednesday is, that is the first day in the season of Lent. And if you don’t know what Lent is, then you probably are not familiar with the liturgical calendar of the Christian church. But that’s ok, I wasn’t either.

That being what it is, the season of Lent is the season that comes right before we celebrate Easter Sunday or Resurrection Sunday, as some prefer to call it.

Why is this day important? Shrove Tuesday helps to prepare the Christian church and all believers who are obedient to the gospel and Jesus Christ, to prepare the celebration of the resurrection of Jesus.

Shrove Tuesday is also known by other names. Probably the most famous is Mardi Gras, or Fat Tuesday, because it marked the last celebration before the season of Lent began on Ash Wednesday. It is typical to observe the season of Lent with fasting and prayer. It is a time to reflect on what it means for us to be saved, to be redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ.

And so as we prepare for the celebration of Easter with the season of Lent. During the next 40 days of reflections, I look forward to exploring more what it means to anticipate and to celebrate the reality that God came in the form of a man in the person of Jesus Christ so that we might have eternal life.

I became exposed to the liturgical calendar during my time in the Methodist Church, and they have put together a daily reflection guided based on a daily word. I liked the idea so much they will serve as the focal point of the devotions that I will be writing over the next few weeks.

I hope that you would join me as we prepare and anticipate the miracle and wonder of the death and resurrection of Jesus this year.

Death 150 Yards Away

Late last year, a young man I’ve never met and of whom I know nothing about died in a car accident. The reason I’m even writing about it; the reason for bringing it up at all is that it happened yards from where I live.

From my vantage point, I knew that it was not a good situation. As the reports finally hit the news wire, it became clear that another life had ended far too soon. Sooner than he and his family and friends expected.

There were so many thoughts and emotions I had that night and even today as I write about it. Many of which you can imagine. But the one that lingers and hovers over them all is this: was he ready?

Not in the sense that he could have anticipated that that day would be his last day on earth. But more in the sense of what was his spiritual life like? Did he have someone who had shared the truth of the Gospel of life with him? The beautiful news that assures us that regardless of the seeming randomness of life, we can live in and with hope.

Was he ready? I don’t know. And in some ways, I am afraid to know. His death saddened me then and it saddens me now. But, it challenges me to do more to speak with those I encounter in my daily journey to consider Jesus and to trust in him.

I guess wondering if he was ready, really makes me wonder if I am ready. Ready to say and do what the Gospel demands and requires of me.

Reflection Prayer:

Almighty God, conform my heart and mind to your will, to be sensitive to the promptings of your Holy Spirit, that I may have eyes to see and ears to hear when you may need me to speak to a wandering soul the Gospel of salvation, in the name of your son Jesus Christ, Amen.

Holy Week 2019 | Monday: Preparation

We don’t know much of what Jesus and the disciples were doing in that final week. What I would guess, is that this was a time of preparation. Jesus understood that his time and ministry on earth were drawing to a close. I am not sure the disciples did at all.

What makes the first few days of Holy Week so difficult is that we don’t know much at all. And so we wait. Preparing for what is to come. Looking back across the centuries we know what happened. But, that does not eliminate the suspense. It does not diminish the anticipation.

Resurrection Sunday is a few days away. But for now, we wait. We prepare for what is to come.

Lent 2018 | Day #3: Preparation

It does not matter what you will ever do in life, the better you prepare the more effective you will be at the task. This reality could not be truer of the Christian life.

It does not matter what you will ever do in life, the better you prepare the more effective you will be at the task. This reality could not be truer of the Christian life. In every facet of our walk with Jesus, we ought to seek out and engage in a continual process of preparation. To be more to the point, we should always be growing in our understanding of the things of God. We should seek to be challenged and stretched in every area of our lives.

Now, I am not saying that this will be easy. I’m not even saying that we will like it! We might. But that is not a guarantee. Nor is it something that we should be overly concerned about. The process of preparation forces us to anticipate what may be coming down the road or just waiting for us as we continue forward by faith.

Anticipation of what is to come is not an easy skill to hone. The truth is that for many of us, it will come through failure rather than “getting it right” from the start. But, that is the normal course of life. We try doing something new and we fall on our faces. This does not diminish us, it only serves as an opportunity for development, if we accept it as one.

As we end these first few days of Lent, I hope that you will journey with me as we see to better understand the impact and import of Jesus life, death, and resurrection. These Reflections Toward Easter will help us to briefly ponder the majesty of God’s Gospel as it is embodied in Jesus. We should not be afraid of preparation. We should grow to love the process and joyfully endure it. That sounds bad, but it really is not. Engaging in the process may produce fruit in your life you never believed possible.

Lent Day #1 | Remember that thou art dust…

Facing our limited time on this earth can be unsettling, but we must never forget that our lives here on this earth are not supposed to last forever. We are sojourners and travelers in this world.

Today is Ash Wednesday. For those who may not know, this is the first day in the season of Lent in the Christian calendar. That’s right, the Christian church has a calendar. I was introduced to this time of the year when I began working at a United Methodist Church as a youth pastor several years ago. The first time I attended the Ash Wednesday service I was surprised that people would go to a service and have ashes put on their foreheads. I have since learned to appreciate these opportunities to reflect on what God is teaching us.
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