Great discussion today with friends Oense and Joel about Lent. I confessed that I had not really seriously celebrated Lent, and I don't think "celebrate" is the right word, but did explain to them that my passive approach was due to different "Lenten baggage" in my life (fair questions: how can you have Lenten baggage?) Anyways, it was an encouraging and challenging conversation that opened my eyes to the process of Lent as we head toward Easter. With that in mind, this prayer is one thing I am going to be saying every morning as I try to draw nearer to Christ over the next forty days.
A prayer from Walter Brueggemann:
The pushing and shoving of the world is endless.
We are pushed and shoved.
And we do our fair share of pushing and shoving
in our great anxiety.
And in the middle of that
you have set down your beloved suffering son
who was like a sheep led to slaughter
who opened not his mouth.
We seem not able,
so we ask you to create space in our life
where we may ponder his suffering
and your summons for us to suffer with him,
suspecting that suffering is the only way to come to newness.
So we pray for your church in these Lenten days,
when we are driven to denial-not to notice suffering,
not to engage it,
not to acknowledge it.
So be that way of truth among us
that we should not deceive ourselves.
That we shall see that loss is indeed our gain.
We give you thanks for that mystery from which we live.
Amen.
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