On Wednesday, February 17, which is Ash Wednesday, we will join churches around the world, beginning the journey of Lent. It is a season of reflection, repentance, and preparation, leading us to Good Friday and preparing us for Easter morning. This season consists of the forty days prior to Easter, which does not include Sundays.
The number forty echoes the forty days Jesus spent in the wilderness after his baptism and before his ministry. It also correlates with the forty days before the flood subsided and the ark reached dry land, the forty days the people wandered in the wilderness before crossing the Jordan River, and the forty days Elijah spent in the desert before hearing the voice of God. It is a period of time, which eventually gives way to something new!
Our worship service on Ash Wednesday will be live streamed at 6:00 p.m. We will remember what the church says to us, “From ashes we have come and to ashes we shall return.” It calls us to see again the gift of life and the grace of love. It invites us to see each day as a sacred opportunity.
We would normally gather each week for our Lenten Lunches. Right now, we are unable to gather for a meal, but we will still reflect on the abiding love of God during Lent. Each Wednesday, we will post a reflection on Abiding Love, thinking about how the love of God holds us, how it engages this world, and how it transforms us.
Lent invites us to reflect on the heart of our faith, which is the love of Christ, standing in solidarity with us on Good Friday and restoring all of creation on Easter morning. As we reflect on Abiding Love, we will consider how we can abide. God abides with us, and we abide with God.
We also abide with one another! We remain connected. We continue to reach out. We stand firm together, even as we are apart!
-Tripp