THE CHURCH INVITES YOU TO THE JOURNEY OF LENT

Dear child of God: the Church invites you into Lent. Lent is a forty-day period of preparation for the celebration of Easter. It is a time to reflect on your relationship with God, your relationships with those among whom you live and work, and your relationship with all of creation around you.

During Lent we ask ourselves who or what our God really is. The way we answer that question should help us to think about the way we live: with our family, our friends, and our co-workers, as well as how we relate to the rest of the world around us.

As we take this time to look at our lives, some of us will find that we need to “adjust” our relationship with God, our family, our friends, or how we treat the world around us. This recognition and adjustment in direction is what the Church means by repentance. We might just see the need to change from self-centered living and ways, to the joys of a life lived with real, honest love at its heart.

Lent is a strong reminder that, one day, each one of us will die. It is a time to reflect on what our lives are really about, and how we spend the time we have. We are reminded that we are “dust,” and that we will return to the earth from which we are made. It is in this reminder that Lent points us to the resurrection of Jesus.

The celebration of Easter is the goal of Lent. The resurrection of Christ is the hope that the Church has to offer to each of us, and to the whole world. While ashes on our foreheads on Ash Wednesday are a powerful reminder that we are mortal, every day the Church carries into the world the message of Jesus’ resurrection as the hope of all people. Living in that hope changes everything for the better!

It would be hard to come to that Easter celebration laden with bankrupt relationships, and with no sense of who we are before God. Lent is there to help us make the adjustments we need to make, in order to be in a realistic relationship with God, and with those around us Then, when the forty days are over, we can really celebrate Easter as the feast of resurrection and renewal.

HOW TO USE THE TIME OF LENT

The Lenten “training methods” of a rich spiritual life have evolved over hundreds of years. In this time, the Church has found these practices to be useful:

Examining– your life and your relationships
Confession– admitting your failures and making them right where possible
Repentance– taking the first steps in turning towards necessary change
Prayer– for your own guidance, wisdom, and strength; for the needs of others, and especially for your enemies
Fasting– to remind you of the desperate needs of others
Acts of self-denial– to expose your dependence on ‘things’
Meditating– on the Scripture’s message and meaning for you

Each of these can be explored in great depth, to provide renewal, comfort, and a new outlook on life.

“Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”

Our congregation follows the custom of marking foreheads with ashes on the first day of Lent as a reminder of our mortality, and of the need all people continually have to renew their faith and repentance. We offer you this sign on Ash Wednesday to start you on your own journey of renewal, so that come Easter Day, you may experience more deeply the joy of the Resurrection.

We use this prayer: “Almighty God, you have created us out of the dust of the earth; Grant that these ashes may be to us a sign of our mortality and penitence, guide us in our Lenten journey so when we arrive at the Easter Day we are once more ready to celebrate our passage with Christ from death to life, from despair to hope; through Christ our Savior. AMEN.”

Saint Barnabas in Chelsea, Michigan, is a welcoming community of the Episcopal Church. We are young and old, rich and poor, straight and gay, liberal and conservative, and most things in between. Our goal is not like-mindedness, but a holy communion of mutual respect and understanding, in order that together we may find God and serve the world in Christ’s name. Our worship is full of beauty in traditional and contemporary Episcopal forms and music. We unafraid to ask questions and admit that we do not have all the answers. Our business is reconciliation: with God, with each other, with all creation. On our spiritual journey, we welcome anyone seeking God, and also those who are merely respectfully curious.

Jesus once said to a disciple, “Come and see!” God doesn’t use coercion; neither do we. Join us when you can. We welcome you!