O that today you would listen!

The Season of Lent is a time of pilgrimage – a pilgrimage of the heart, mind, and spirit. On Ash Wednesday, we were not only marked by a smudge on our foreheads, we were invited to embrace a conscious “Observance of Lenten Discipline”:

“Dear brothers and sisters in Christ: the early Christians observed with great devotion the days of our Lord’s passion and resurrection, and it became the custom of the Church that before the Easter celebration there should be a 40-day season of spiritual preparation....”

Most of our Scripture readings during Lent have depicted wilderness experiences: of Jesus’ 40 days of temptation; of the Hebrews 40 years between Egypt and their promised land; of Adam and Eve banished from the Garden; of Abram (later to be known as Abraham) led to “the land that I [God] will show you”; of Nicodemus’ journey from darkness to light, from curious awareness to active discipleship.

Meanwhile, the witness of the Apostle Paul writing to the Romans has been persistent and insistent:

“. . . what proves that God loves us is that Christ died for us while we were still sinners. Having died to make us righteous, is it likely that he would now fail to save us from God’s anger?” (Romans 5:8-9)
“If it is certain that through one man’s fall so many died, it is even more certain that divine grace, coming through the one man, Jesus Christ, came to so many as an abundant free gift. The results of the gift also outweigh the results of one man’s sin: for after one single fall came judgement with a verdict of condemnation, now after many falls comes grace with its verdict of acquittal.” (Romans 5:15b-16)

To borrow again from our “Invitation to the Observance of Lenten Discipline”:

“In this way the whole congregation was reminded of the mercy and forgiveness proclaimed in the gospel of Jesus Christ and the need we all have to renew our faith. I invite you, therefore, . . . to observe a holy Lent: by self-examination and repentance; by prayer, fasting, and self-denial; and by reading and meditating on God’s Holy Word.”

An ancient Psalmist extended the invitation simply and pointedly: “O that today you would listen to his voice!” (Psalm 95:7b) May God guide your hearing, your searching, and your journey with Jesus in these 40 days.