AGAIN & AGAIN
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Year after year, the Church tells the story of God, Creation, Christ, and the Church with a series of seasons and feasts that help us remember who we are and whose we are. Part of the great historical tradition of the Church down the centuries, again and again we prepare for the great celebration of Christ’s Resurrection with the season of Lent, a time of reflection, repentance, and renewal. Lent helps us draw closer to God in our humanness, acknowledging the broken places in our lives and in our world, and sojourning with Christ in his determined steps toward Easter morning and the revelation that Love wins. It’s a beautiful season of discovery and devotion that deepens our faith in powerful, life-giving and -renewing ways.
This year, we have partnered with our friends at A Sanctified Art LLC who have provided materials for our previous “Unraveled” series this past summer and also our “Those Who Dream …” Advent series last December. Understanding how the world has changed in the past year but also how the human condition has in many ways stayed the same, how we still need Christ to lead us through the wilderness of our lives and into a better way of living in this world, they have fashioned a series fit for 2021’s Lenten season: “Again & Again …” The authors explain:
“In Lent, we’re reminded that, again and again, suffering and brokenness find us. We doubt again, we lament again, we mess up again. Again and again, the story of Jesus on the cross repeats — every time lives are taken unjustly, every time the powerful choose corruption and violence, every time individuals forget how to love. With exacerbation we exclaim, ‘Again?! How long, O God?’ And yet, in the midst of the motion blur chaos of our lives, God offers a sacred refrain: ‘I choose you, I love you, I will lead you to repair.’ Again and again, God breaks the cycle and offers us a new way forward.
“This theme provides a clear invitation in a time when much is unclear. Even if worshiping apart, we come to God again and again with our prayers, our dreams, our hopes, and our doubts. Even if from a distance, we will continue to be community to one another — especially when it’s hard — by choosing each other over and over again. We will continue to love God with the same persistence God chooses and claims us…. We need the 40 days of Lent because this season shapes us into more faithful disciples.”
The first Sunday in Lent is February 21, but we will already be four days into the season by then! We will start our Lenten journey this year with an online Ash Wednesday service on February 17 and a weekly Saturday afternoon “Faith & Film” movie watch party. And as with our previous series from A Sanctified Art, there is a daily devotional combining poetry (access and download here), art, scripture, prayers, and reflections from ministers and artists alike to guide us toward the Empty Tomb.
Again and again, Jesus invites us to follow him along the road to Jerusalem, to trust in God’s promises, and discover anew the healing of ourselves and our world. Join us this Lent as we seek to become Easter people once again.
Soli Deo Gloria,
Rev. Michael