Daily Devotions

Admittedly, Lent does not seem to have the same allure as that of Advent, does it? The same excitement or anticipation seems to be missing and consequently we can approach the season with disinterest or dissatisfaction. No wonder the great Henri Nouwen prayed, “O Lord, make this Lenten season different from the other ones. Let me find you again. Amen."

Did Paul have the right Lenten attitude in his letter when he wrote, “ I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.  All of us, then, who are mature should take such a view of things. And if on some point you think differently, that too God will make clear to you.” Philippians 3:14-15

So what is our goal and where does it come from? Jesus in Mark 7:21 says, “it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come!” Jesus is here teaching us a  lesson about the heart that  has to be repeated and continually stressed. Good manners and proper behaviour vary from group to group. But the underlying goodness or badness crosses all social divides.

In ’A Confession,’ Leo Tolstoy relates how the drive toward goodness that moved him as a boy was erased by his experiences in society. Later in life, after overwhelming success as a writer, he nevertheless sank into a psychological paralysis brought on by his vision of the futilty of everything. The awareness that the passage of time alone would bring everything he loved and valued to nothing left him completely hopeless. For years he lived in this condition, until he finally came to faith in a world of God where all that is good is preserved.

That is precisely the world of the spiritual that Jesus opened to humanity long ago and still opens to those who seek it. Perhaps today we should simply pray with Henri Nouwen, “O Lord, make this Lenten season different from the other ones. Let me find you again. Amen."

Daily Devotions

Catherine Doherty, was a Russian-born Catholic activist who founded the Madonna House Apostolate in 1947. She was a pioneer in the struggle for interracial justice, a spiritual writer, lecturer, and spiritual mother to priests and laity. One of her many writings contained the words,  “Lent is a time of going very deeply into ourselves...What is it that stands between us and God? Between us and our brothers and sisters? Between us and life, the life of the Spirit? Whatever it is, let us relentlessly tear it out, without a moment's hesitation." 

We call this deep spiritual mining as ‘seeing with the eyes of the heart.’ Or as the writer to the Ephesians puts it,”Open the eyes of their hearts, and let the light of Your truth flood in. Shine Your light on the hope You are calling them to embrace. Reveal to them the glorious riches You are preparing as their inheritance.” (The Voice Version)

Jesus in Matthew illustrates the danger of not paying attention to inner motives when he says, “How terrible …… You clean the outside of the cup and plate, but inside they are full of violence and pleasure seeking. First clean the inside of the cup so that the outside of the cup will be clean too.”

Interestingly the only people Jesus denounces in the Gospel are the Pharisees and their like. He accuses them of not understanding God because they don’t see the importance of the fundamentals of justice, mercy and faith.

So often it takes one person to see and to state what is going wrong and to reset the priorities. Jesus does this again and again in his dealings with “sinners”: people whose behaviour runs contrary to the Jewish Law. He heals and he forgives sins, where as Pharisees and others rush to condemn and even destroy.

Lord, create in me a clean heart. Life is so complicated, busy and chaotic. But amid the mess, please give me the strength and courage to see people, places, things and events through Your lens. Please guide me and change me, oh God. Please give me Your heart for others and the world around me. Each and every day, help me to see, through Your eyes, the truth of what is, what has been and what will one day come. In the name of Your son Jesus I pray, Amen.

Daily Devotions

Pope Francis, in his succinct and humble way announces that “Lent comes providentially to awaken us, to shake us from our lethargy.

In many ways, the word lent is a clue to this journey of awakening, where some think that it derives from the old English word for lengthen. Of course throughout the Lenten period, we are becoming aware that the whole of creation returns to life and growth as it leaves the darkness of winter behind.

Five times in Mark 13 Jesus tells us to be attentive. Yet, we would so often rather settle down to a comfortable life. But just as the buds of nature are reawakening, the world of God is breaking in everywhere, like an invasion. 

Jesus' message and life was to make a difference and save the world. That's the call - to do the world a world of good. We are called to stay awake, to see how we can make someone else's life that bit better. We need to believe that each of us can make a difference to our families, to the neighbourhood in which we live. 

One way is to keep in touch with God through Lent is to wake up through prayer, the sharing of fellowship, helping the very poor and keeping in touch with God. In short, we allow God's grace and care to flow through us.

A new world order began with Jesus, and we have a part to play in it. Every day through Lent we can review what went on, and as G M Hopkins says, ‘I greet him the days I meet him, and bless when I understand’.

Lord, we ask you to give us more strength to stay awake!, to seek you more deeply in prayer, and to rely on your help to live fully in your  ways. May we stay awake! to become more fully alive in you and so remain watchful, stand firm in the faith, out of my love for you. Amen.

Daily Devotions

Today, on our Lenten Journey,  we have a question to answer from Megan Westra, a children's and worship pastor who asks, “What if we view this desert time of Lent as not just a time to reflect or to lament or to confess or to fast, but a time where we learn to be free?" 

I wonder, have you ever placed yourself in wilderness of temptation and considered the things  Jesus faced? 

Jesus, like Moses before him, retreats into the wilderness where he fasts for forty days. Each temptation involves a seizure of power: power over the elements of creation by turning stones into bread, political and military power by gaining power over the kingdoms of the world, and the power to force God's protection in an inappropriate manner. That Jesus was tested throughout his ministry was widely held in early Christianity. The Letter to the Hebrews tells us, "For do we not have a high priest (Jesus) who is unable to sympathise with out weakness, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin."

Yet, what do we make of Megan’s second premise, “a time where we learn to be free!”

In John 8 we have the astounding words, “that the Truth will set us free” and specifically “If the Son has set us free we are free indeed!”

Jesus hearers were stuck in their sense of themselves, in the pride they took in their heritage. Perhaps we can admit that we too have sometimes climbed the wrong heights, have mistakenly congratulated ourselves. We need to realise that our true dignity lives in our being a children of God. We pray that we may show our true worth in how we live and call others to a deeper and richer sense of themselves.

Jesus wants to lead us into truth so that we may be free. If we truly desire freedom, we need to be ready to accept the truth. There is nothing threatening or accusatory here-it is about being known fully and loved deeply.

Lord, you told of these temptations to your disciples - how else would they have known? Can I put words on my own temptations, the weaknesses or wickedness that draw me in particular? Can I see my temptations as you did, against the backdrop of the vocation to which you call me and find your promised freedom today. I pray so in Jesus name.  Amen

Daily Devotions

Our second Lenten thought for this week comes from Chuck Colsonn. He became an evangelical Christian in 1973. His mid-life religious conversion sparked a radical life change that led to the founding of his non-profit ministry, the Prison Fellowship and three years later, the Prison Fellowship International. His intention was to  focus on teaching and training around the world. He claimed, “Lent affords us the opportunity to search the depths of our sin and experience the heights of God's love." 

Perhaps the one Psalm that constantly challenges me is Psalm 139 and particularly the words “If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast. even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you.”

This is the unfolding mystery of honestly journeying through Lent, but it can depend on what we call the heights and depths of this path towards Easter. Surely it is the fact that Jesus is the one walks who alongside us whether we are in the deepest darkness or the glorious light of his glory. Let me share another element of this ever present light of Christ, for in 1John 1:5 we read, “This, in essence, is the message we heard from Christ and are passing on to you: God is light, pure light; there’s not a trace of darkness in him.” (the Message)

A young girl once consulted with her minister. "I cannot stick it out any longer. I am the only Christian in the factory where I work. I get nothing but taunts and sneers. It is more than I can stand. I am going to resign." 

"Will you tell me," asked the minister, "where lights are placed?" 

"What has that to do with it?" the young Christian asked him rather bluntly.

"Never mind," the minister replied. "Answer my question: Where are lights placed?"

"I suppose in dark places," she replied. "Yes, and that is why you have been put in that factory where there is such spiritual darkness and where there is no other Christian to shine for the Lord."

The young Christian realised for the first time the opportunity that was hers. She felt she could not fail God by allowing her light to go out. She went back to the factory with renewed determination to let her light shine in that dark corner. Before long, she was the means of leading nine other girls to the Light.

Father in Heaven, You made me Your child and called me to walk in the Light of Christ. Free me from darkness and keep me in the Light of Your Truth. The Light of Jesus that has scattered the darkness of hatred and sin. Called to that Light, I ask for Your guidance. Form my life in Your Truth, my heart in Your Love. Through the fellowship of our Holy presence, give me the power of Your Grace that I may walk in the Light of Jesus and serve Him faithfully. Amen

Daily Devotions

As we continue our journey through Lent, we will now look at different ways  holding the 40 days of reflection. We start with Elizabeth Hyndman, a Christian writer and editor who wrote, “There are three elements that are almost always part of Lent: prayer, giving something up, and giving something back." 

Sadie Sieker, for many years served as a house-parent for the children of mission partners in the Philippines. Sadie loved books. Though she gladly loaned out some books, others she treasured in case under her bed. Once, in the quiet of the night, Sadie heard a faint gnawing sound. After searching all around her room, she discovered that the noise was coming from her beneath the bed in the case. When she opened it, she found nothing but an enormous pile of dust. All the books she had kept to herself had been lost to termites. The moral to this tale seems to say, “What we give away, we keep. What we hoard, we lose.”

The familiar words of Jesus in Mark 8:34–36 come to mind, “He called the crowd with his disciples and said to them, “If any wish to come after me, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? Indeed, what can they give in return for their life?”

Following Jesus means making choices and choices mean that we leave some possibilities behind even as we pick up new God-directed opportunities. As we deny ourselves this Lent, we ask Jesus to help us not to become regretful or nostalgic but to face the future confidently.

Eternal God, holy and faithful, 

what can we give in return for our life? 

Teach us to take up the cross of Christ 

with grateful hearts and humble spirits, 

offering all for the sake of the gospel, 

so that we may receive life in fullness; 

through Christ, who is coming in glory. Amen

Daily Devotions

It can be said that sometimes a mother's love has to be a tough love.  Deuteronomy 32:18 “You were unmindful of the Rock that bore you; you forgot the God who gave you birth.”

 It was Helen Rice who penned the poem

A Mother’s love is something
that no one can explain,
It is made of deep devotion
and of sacrifice and pain,

It is endless and unselfish
and enduring come what may
For nothing can destroy it
or take that love away . . .

Solomon Rosenberg, his wife, his two sons, and his mother and father were arrested and placed in a Nazi concentration camp during the Holocaust of WWII. It was a labour camp and the rules were simple: As long as you can do your work, you are permitted to live. When you become too weak to do your work, then you will be exterminated.

Rosenberg watched his mother and father being marched off to their deaths when they became too weak to work. He knew that his youngest son, David, would be next because David had always been a frail child. Every evening when Rosenberg came back into the barracks after his hours of labour, he would search for the faces of his family. When he found them, they would huddle together, embrace one another, and thank God for another day of life.

One day Rosenberg came back, but he didn't see those familiar faces. He finally discovered his oldest son, Joshua, in a corner, huddled, weeping, and praying. He said, "Josh, tell me it's not true." Joshua turned and said, "It is true, Poppa. Today David was not strong enough to do his work, so they came for him."

"But where is your mother?" asked Mr. Rosenberg.

"Oh Poppa," he exclaimed. "When they came for David, he was afraid and he was crying. Momma said, ‘There is nothing to be afraid of, David,' and then she took his hand and went with him."

What was it Paul wrote to the Romans 5:6-8 “While we were still weak, at the right moment, Christ died for ungodly people. It isn’t often that someone will die for a righteous person, though maybe someone might dare to die for a good person. But God shows his love for us, because while we were still sinners Christ died for us.”

Lord,

This is love.

Not that you spoke words of comfort,

walked with the unclean and unloved,

shared wisdom, bread and wine,

brought healing into lives

and challenged the status quo.

This is love.

That you spoke the word of God,

walked a painful road to the Cross,

shared living water, bread of life,

brought Salvation to the world

and died for the sake of all.

This is love.

It is a seed

sown in the ground,

which germinates,

blossoms,

and spreads its sweet perfume. Amen