Lent begins today. I’d like to submit to you short meditations each day through Lent and the first week of Easter. They will be based on scripture texts used on that day in Roman Catholic churches and other churches throughout the world.
God bless you,
Dave
Today’s readings: Click on today’s date at http://www.usccb.org/bible/
When will it be now?
Wednesday, March 5, 2014
Ash Wednesday
Joel 2:12-13
Even now, says the Lord, return to me with your whole heart … Rend your heart, not your garments, and return to the Lord, your God. For gracious and merciful is he.
I have lots of choices. My wife, my mom, my kids, my grandkids, my friends, my neighbors, my church, the schools I have attended, other churches, organizations, restaurants and gyms all have agendas in which I want to participate. A little.
Now … and then.
The ashes on my forehead show off one agenda. Look on me, Lord, and show me your mercy. Create in me a clean heart. Now.
Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5, “Now is a very acceptable time. Now is the day of salvation.” Bring salve to my sore body and bones, to the skin of my gritting teeth, which late at night I see is all I have to show for those agendas that claim me, claim me, claim me.
I enjoy participating in the community of faith by writing these Lent reflections. But these next seven weeks are not only social. They bring God’s agenda for me into the foreground, and the best moments in these 40 days are the sweet times I spend searching out His word for me, sitting with it and settling it into my heart. Into my gut. Into the center of me. Into the core of me, where God is waiting to be found.
I’m held close, Lord, in your embrace, and when I turn to the other gods I love I can no longer feel your sweet breath on my face or the warmth of your cheek. But I am afraid of your eyes, and so I do turn. Away. Forgive me, and let me regain my willingness to be known by you. Today. Now. And then again … now.
http://www.christiancounselingservice.com/archived_devotions.php?article_id=1234
