Lent Readings

[Tuo]

In previous years I've posted a prayer a day for Lent. This year I thought I'd try to do the same thing but with Bible readings. I'll be using the Anglican lectionary for this year, but will choose just one passage, and may only post part of it - just to keep the length manageable. Come and join in (add thoughts, comments, prayers, whatever) if you'd like to.

Day 1: 10th February - Psalm 103, 8-14

The Lord is full of compassion and mercy,
slow to anger and of great kindness.
He will not always accuse us,
nor will he keep his anger for ever.
He has not dealt with us according to our sins,
nor rewarded us according to our wickedness.
For as the heavens are high above the earth,
so is his mercy great upon those who fear him.
As far as the east is from the west,
so far has he removed our sins from us.
As a father cares for his children,
so does the Lord care for those who fear him.
For he himself knows whereof we are made;
he remembers that we are but dust.

'Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return'. The psalmist reminds us of our weakness and frailty, but only in order to remind us that God's love for us is always greater than our ability to mess up; that just as a parent loves her or his children - not despite their vulnerability but because of it - God loves us and forgives our mistakes, and that whenever the fragile edifices of our lives and our selves seem to be about to crumble to nothingness, God can rebuild us and make us whole again. May this Lent be a time of rebuilding. And, in refashioning ourselves from the dust, may we also try to find ways to support those around us as they too work to reshape themselves anew.

AN atheist, even....

Thanks Tuo, you are so good at finding the message of hope and love. I read that and see that if I don't shape up in another 12 months, you can cut me down...
But maybe that's because you do bear fruit, whereas I... oh ok, I'm not completely useless all the time, but let's just say there's quite a bit to work on...

Welcome Spaceopera. There are a few of us who got gripped by the Christian message after years of not believing. (Not me, I've been a Christian since about age 10, so I know a thing or two about the comfort the Christian faith brings, wouldn't want to be without it)

Yes TUO is wonderful at finding the messages of hope and support that we all need.

Don't be hard on yourself Edith God sees the heart and recognises the difficulties and the effort.

Ah, SpaceOpera - this thread is just about a personal reflection on each day's passage. I don't claim any real theological training or deep knowledge. I just jot down a few thoughts on what I read and hope that they mean something to someone else.

Edith - I know... I read the passage at first as 'sort yourself out or I'll fetch the axe...'! But then I reflected back on what I had written earlier on this thread about the difference between embracing Christ, hoping in Christ - starting to bear fruit, if you like - and being 'perfected', accomplishing God's work for us fully , which is not something any of us can hope for in just 12 months. So I decided to post it with a hopeful comment anyway.

Here's another message of hope, then...

*February 29th: John 5, 7-15

A Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus said to her, ‘Give me a drink’. (His disciples had gone to the city to buy food.) The Samaritan woman said to him, ‘How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?’ (Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans.) Jesus answered her, ‘If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, “Give me a drink”, you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.’ The woman said to him, ‘Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us the well, and with his sons and his flocks drank from it?’ Jesus said to her, ‘Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.’ The woman said to him, ‘Sir, give me this water, so that I may never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.’

This is just part of the passage for today, but it's a passage that has been discussed a lot on here, and I don't want to get sidetracked by what seem to me (for my purposes on here) to be minor issues relating to the woman's sexual behaviour and marital status.

The Samaritan woman is both defensive ('Why are you talking to me? You're not meant to be talking to me! Why are you asking me for a drink? I can't give you a drink. You wouldn't accept a drink from me anyway...': Jesus clearly makes her feel deeply uncomfortable) and a bit obtuse ('And how on earth can you offer me living water when you don't even have a bucket?'), and yet something in her really wants to accept Jesus' offer of living water. She is shocked and surprised by her own receptiveness to this man who, by all accepted norms, shouldn't be talking to her at all and who offers her somethign she doesn't really need or consciously want (she has water; he's the one who doesn't have water...). I think a few of us have been in the position of trying to give Jesus the cold shoulder, of saying 'Look, I think you've got it wrong; you can't possibly mean me', of being simultaneously fascinated and boggled. Dare we accept the water that we are being offered?

1st March: John 8, 2-11

Early in the morning he came again to the temple. All the people came to him and he sat down and began to teach them. The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery; and making her stand before all of them, they said to him, ‘Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?’ They said this to test him, so that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, ‘Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.’ And once again he bent down and wrote on the ground. When they heard it, they went away, one by one, beginning with the elders; and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus straightened up and said to her, ‘Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?’ She said, ‘No one, sir.’ And Jesus said, ‘Neither do I condemn you. Go your way, and from now on do not sin again.’

A little while ago, I became a bit fascinated by Jesus' writing in the dust in this passage. I have no idea how others interpret this, but in the context of Lent it reminded me of the priest using a finger dipped in ash to mark the foreheads of penitents with the sign of the cross. That cross in ash is not a sign of the priest judging those who come forward, though, for the priest's forehead is marked too. Rather it's a sign of our common humanity, our community as people journeying, however inadequately, towards the hope of Easter. No-one can cast the first stone in this passage (not even the judgey-pants scribes and Pharisees) because we are all sinners: none of us is perfect, none of us is 'good enough', none of us deserves to stand in judgement over others. Not to be condemned doesn't mean that we don't need to strive to do better, but it does mean that we are forgiven, set free, sent on our way to try again. Jesus draws (almost literally here) a line in the sand under weakness, and gives us a second (and third, fourth, millionth) chance.

2nd March: Psalm 84, 1-6

How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of hosts!
My soul has a desire and longing to enter the courts of the Lord;
my heart and my flesh rejoice in the living God.
The sparrow has found her a house
and the swallow a nest where she may lay her young:
at your altars, O Lord of hosts, my King and my God.
Blessed are they who dwell in your house:
they will always be praising you.
Blessed are those whose strength is in you,
in whose heart are the highways to Zion,
Who going through the barren valley find there a spring,
and the early rains will clothe it with blessing.
They will go from strength to strength
and appear before God in Zion.

The sparrow has found a house and the swallow a nest where she may lay her young. This is such a simple image, yet such a powerful one too. Sparrows and swallows are fragile and vulnerable creatures, yet in God they can feel completely safe and protected. We too are fragile and vulnerable, yet we too could find something of this sense of security and protection if we could just find ways of trying to be closer to God. The image is reinforced by the image - which we have also seen in previous passages - of the desert which is watered by God and made fertile. If we are on the right road, we will be provided for, reassured, kept safe. The psalmist reminds us that we have only to try - to set out on this journey with the true aim of reaching God - and God will give us strength for the road to be travelled and will ensure that we find our true home at the end of it.

I love that tuo. What a nice passage to start the day.

I have another psalm for today...

3rd March: Psalm 95, 1-2 & 6-7

O come, let us sing to the Lord;
let us heartily rejoice in the rock of our salvation.
Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving
and be glad in him with psalms.
Come, let us worship and bow down
and kneel before the Lord our Maker.
For he is our God;
we are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand.

Nothing complex in this passage. Just two simple and complementary points: 1. God loves us; we are his people; he protects and values us like a shepherd with his sheep; he feeds us and nourishes us; just like yesterday's sparrow and swallow, we find our home, our resting place, in him; and 2. we should celebrate this: we should sing and give thanks and worship and pray and generally rejoice in God's love for us. God's love is truly something to celebrate; let's be happy.

Yes indeed TUO. There is so much in the psalms, thanks for sharing.

4th March - Mark 12, 28-31

One of the scribes came near and heard them disputing with one another, and seeing that he answered them well, he asked him, ‘Which commandment is the first of all?’ Jesus answered, ‘The first is, “Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.” The second is this, “You shall love your neighbour as yourself.” There is no other commandment greater than these.’

I read this passage now (as, I believe, Jesus intended it then) as an answer to those who read the Bible as a complicated 'rule-book'. There are rules, to be sure, but they can be boiled down to these two things: love God; love one another. Any of the ways in which we may mess up in our lives stem ultimately from a failure on one of these two counts. My prayer today is that God grant me the ability to love - to love God and to love those around me - abundantly, freely, altruistically, with joy and with compassion.

I'm reminded too of the responses we've been using in Lent (from Common Worship):

This is love, not that we loved God,
but that he loved us and sent his Son.
He is the sacrifice for our sins,
that we might live through him.
If God loves us so much
we ought to love one another.
If we love one another
God lives in us.

5th March - Psalm 116, 1-7

I love the Lord,
for he has heard the voice of my supplication;
because he inclined his ear to me
on the day I called to him.
The snares of death encompassed me;
the pains of hell took hold of me;
by grief and sorrow was I held.
Then I called upon the name of the Lord:
‘O Lord, I beg you, deliver my soul.’
Gracious is the Lord and righteous;
our God is full of compassion.
The Lord watches over the simple;
I was brought very low and he saved me.
Turn again to your rest, O my soul,
for the Lord has been gracious to you.
For you have delivered my soul from death,
my eyes from tears and my feet from falling.

I love God because he has heard me. God may not have brought us, or those we love, back from the brink of death, but when we are low he is there for us; he does hear us when we call to him; he is compassionate in the face of our grief, drying our tears and guiding our feet. As an inveterate worrier and someone who often hides fear, stress and anxiety beneath a veneer of busyness, there is huge comfort in the verse 'Turn again to your rest, O my soul, for the Lord has been gracious to you'. May we all rest well tonight, in the knowledge that God hears us, loves us, and cares for us.

Just place marking.

Hello drspouse and welcome!

6th March (Mothering Sunday): John 19, 25-27

Meanwhile, standing near the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing beside her, he said to his mother, ‘Woman, here is your son.’ Then he said to the disciple, ‘Here is your mother.’ And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home.

I love this short passage so much, not because it's about 'mothers' as a noun, but because it's about mothering as a verb. Jesus entrusts John to Mary, knowing that she will 'mother' him (care for him, love him, as Jesus himself loved him). But he also entrusts his mother to John, knowing that John will love and care for her - by extension, if not literally, 'mothering' her by bringing her into his family. And this reminds me of the passage I posted two days ago. If we love God and love one another we 'mother' one another in this broad sense. And if, when we pray 'Our Father, who art in Heaven...', we imagine perhaps a more distant parent-figure, we should remember that God, who loves us, is also our Mother, the door of whose home is always open to us.

Thank you for the passages. It helps knowing that there are other people trying to go beyond the surface of lent to something deeper.
Tuo as a non parent I love the idea that I can 'mother' someone.

I am popping in and out but have not had time to think and post but do appreciate you posting tuo.

Hello SingaSong: it's good to see you. And you too BES... It's nice to know that people are reading. And of course you can 'mother', Sing...

7th March: Song of Songs 8, 6-7

Set me as a seal upon your heart,
as a seal upon your arm;
for love is strong as death,
passion fierce as the grave.
Its flashes are flashes of fire,
a raging flame.
Many waters cannot quench love,
neither can floods drown it.
If one offered for love
all the wealth of one’s house,
it would be utterly scorned.

I've been posting a lot about love in the last few days, and there is nothing as passionately loving as the Song of Songs... sometimes in a somewhat disturbingly vivid way, of course. But as we start on the countdown to Easter and start to prepare for the inevitable engagement with Jesus' death on the Cross it is perhaps as well to have this model of all-encompassing, overwhelming, unquenchable love in front of us. Love that is as strong as death and as fierce as the grave. Love that, in Jesus' case, is stonger than death and that rises from the grave. Unquenchable, undrownable, unkillable love.

I've never read Song of Songs . Or even all the psalms. I'm loving these passages tuo.

Hello!

Song of Songs is fantastic Edith (also the Psalms, although they have their difficulties).

At my church we read part of this passage in our All Souls service, where we remember the dead. I'm not sure that love is stronger than death in Jesus's case - in a way that seems to be denying death its terrible reality - and puts them into an adversarial relationship, as if it is love and death fighting. Death is strong; it is real; but love is as strong, as real. The reality of love makes something new out of death - it isn't that death works backwards, but that life begins anew. And there is something fierce and terrible about love in this passage, too. It isn't a sentimental, softly-lovely sort of love, but a strong, flashing, fierce love. The kind of love that would spark new life and bring heaven down to walk upon the earth.

Yes, niminy... I didn't mean that love was stronger than death in the sense that it negates death (or pain or evil or all the things that are not-love) but that, in the end, not even death can make love stop...

Yes, indeed ....

8th March: Hebrews 1 3, 1-3

Let mutual love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it. Remember those who are in prison, as though you were in prison with them; those who are being tortured, as though you yourselves were being tortured.

A very different kind of passage about love. It reminds me of the passage from Matthew 25 that I shared on 15th February: a reminder that when we do things for our fellow human beings we are doing them for God. And it also reminds me of the passage from Mark that I posted on 4th March: a reminder that we should love God and love our neighbour, that we should love God in our neighbour, that we should love our neighbour because we love God. And, on top of all that, a reminder that, above all, we should love the oppressed, the weak, the needy... who may also be angels to us; that is, in whom we may, in some way, see God.

I wrote a long post, and then I realised that everything I'd said could be better said by this clip:

I'm all about video clips today! But this one also makes the point:

Thank you so much, niminy!

9th March: John 10, 11-18

‘I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away—and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father.’

This is another one of those passages that can feel like a cliche (How many of us had, growing up, a little card with a blond blue-eyed Jesus on it, with a lamb tucked under his arm?) but rewards going beyond the obvious image. Jesus doesn't promise us that there will be no wolves; he promises us that he won't leave us, not even when the wolves come; he reassures us that we are all part of his flock - one flock, one shepherd, no-one excluded, no-one left to deal withe the wolves alone; and he tells us that he knows us intimately, and that we know, or can know, him - and through him, and in him, we can know God too.

A message I very much needed to hear this morning, thanks TUO