Preparation

Friday in the Fifth Week of Lent

Let me hear of your loving-kindness in the morning,

for I put my trust in you;

show me the road that I must walk,

for I lift up my soul to you.

Psalm 143:8

As the day begins, I find I am already in need of more quiet. I need to settle my soul. For all that comes next. For the holy walk ahead. For the destination.

Soon this path will twist and turn, taking me from triumph to betrayal, through fear, loss, and abandonment. I will once again behold the relationships around Jesus torn and strengthened, promises broken and kept, hope shredded and renewed. I will stand  witness to all the harshness the world has to offer. And I will still find a way to speak love.

How will I prepare to enter the valley of the shadow of death? For it must be entered. In order to complete this journey. In order to arrive.

Still

Thursday in the Fifth Week of Lent

But I still my soul and make it quiet,

like a child upon its mother’s breast;

my soul is quieted within me.

Psalm 131:3

I am not ready for all that comes next.

Nevertheless, it comes. Without my consent or cooperation. Because I am not in charge.

I become still. I quiet myself. I lay my head and my heart against the comfort of God’s grace.

Divergence

Wednesday in the Fifth Week of Lent

Great peace have they who love your law;

for them there is no stumbling block.

Psalm 119:165

I stop in my tracks, captivated. Like a stream flowing around an obstacle, the brick path I’m walking splits, diverting to either side of the large rock that juts up in its way. 

Clearly there was no removing this rock when the path was laid. And on this stony slope, no alternate route. The would-be stumbling block has become a beautiful sculpture, because a path was able to diverge.

How many obstacles can be transformed by God’s fluid grace?  By holy peace that will always find its way?

Below the rock, the path rejoins, and I continue on my way, arriving surely at my destination.

Waterline

Tuesday in the Fifth Week of Lent

Restore our fortunes, O Lord,

like the watercourses of the Negev.

Psalm 126:5

Restoration begins...

Snug

 Monday in the Fifth Week of Lent

Into your hands I commend my spirit,

for you have redeemed me,

O Lord, O God of truth.

Psalm 31:5

The day grays, and I acknowledge that I did not go for a walk earlier as I had planned when the sun was shining. I could go now. It is not rainy and remains warm enough that a light coat would suffice. But I am comfortable in my chair and my warm sweatshirt with a throw on my lap. I don’t want to move.

While I love to be out in nature, lately I have more often chosen the comfort of feeling snug. Perhaps I am still craving security after all the upheaval and grief of the past three years.

I do know that my safety lies with God. And I have experienced God’s saving presence many, many times--on this Lenten path and on the journey of these past disruptive years. It seems just at the moment when I think I am bereft and none can help, holy hope makes itself known.

So, I will appreciate my comfort this gray afternoon and not scold myself. I will place myself in in the hands of the one who has already redeemed me, and I will soak up the solace that replenishes my soul.

Water stations

Saturday in the Fourth Week of Lent

Whoever is wise will ponder these things,

and consider well the mercies of the Lord.

Psalm 107:43

Partway through the rainy afternoon, I pause to center myself again. The day’s tasks have proved themselves wily, distracting, and inscrutable. I lost an early skirmish with FB. I once again proved to myself (and anyone else who cares) that multi-tasking is only doing several tasks poorly. And I’m pretty sure I had two peanut butter and honey sandwiches for lunch without noticing.

Past experience tells me it is about that time. This is always the point along the Lenten trail when I find myself pummeled by shoulds and frustrations and resentments. Tools of the enemy to lure me off the path.

Which means it is time to reach for gratitude and mercy, God’s balm which is to be found all along the way, like water stations of living grace. I pause, I ponder, I consider. I cradle my soul in my arms and offer it to the holy one for safe-keeping.

Surrender

Thursday in the Fourth Week of Lent

O God, you know my foolishness,

and my faults are not hidden from you.

Psalm 69:6

Even though the weather has warmed, I pull my sweater close around my shoulders to ward off the spring chill. The day’s drizzle brings welcome moisture even as its dullness dampens spirits.

The surface of my desk has become a bumpy road, strewn with sticky notes, open books, bulletin drafts, and two cups of coffee one of which may still be warm. As the clamor of unsettled details threatens to upend any sense of calm I might possess, I pause. And in the lull I try to find myself.

In the midst of worship planning, website updating, and calendar wrangling I have lost my way. I can tell. Because I feel flustered, and I try to work too quickly, and I keep thinking I can accomplish just one more thing…and one more…and just one more….

As if I can manage these last laps of Lent into submission. 

Instead, I let the lull lengthen. Until the noise in my brain subsides. Until I can hear the patter of the gentle rain, dripping one soul-nourishing drop of living water after another into the well-trodden earth. Until I let go of my foolishness once again. Until I surrender to the place where I am. 

God's day

Wednesday in the Fourth Week of Lent

Steady my footsteps in your word;

let no iniquity have dominion over me.

Psalm 119:133

It is the bird song that I notice now in the mornings, as if God’s creatures are singing to me personally about the coming of spring. The petite daffodils splash their yellow brightness across the bottom of the yard, and I know the afternoon sun will warm away the day’s early chill. Indoors, my peace lily preens on a sunlit windowsill, its three blooms leaning toward to light.

Creation carries God’s word to me, surrounding my path with cheerfulness, mercy, and reassurance. My heart, my ways, my life belong to God. As long as I remember this, the enemy cannot mess with my day.

Still time

Monday in the Fourth Week of Lent

 

Remember, God, how short life is,

how frail you have made all flesh.

Psalm 89:47

 

How has my Lent gone so far? This is honestly the question I wake with. I wonder. Part of my Lenten practice is these devolutions, taking time each day to mediate on God’s presence and my own sense of journey. Rather than giving up something, I take on this daily discipline of writing, of self-examination, of soul baring.

 

Even so, I can lose track of the amendment of life this season calls for. As the weather warms and bulbs begin to bloom, I want to shed thoughts of sin and repentance like I shed winter coats.

 

The forty days calls me back. God knows my resolve can be flimsy and my love of comfort robust. Yet grace and tradition give me more time, wider space, greater leeway. There is room for missteps and time to recover, recommit, rededicate. Time yet to remain open to where this path takes me.

Mercy soak

Saturday in the Third Week of Lent

Give thanks to the God of heaven,

for God’s mercy endures forever.

Psalm 136:26

Before I sit down in my comfy chair, I refill my large water glass. I have been consciously drinking water all day, perhaps because I neglected to keep up with my intake this past week.

Sometimes I hardly think of the water I drink. Other times, I experience pleasure at the refreshment it provides, and can almost feel it hydrating my cells as I swallow each mouthful. A cup of cool water is a blessing, a kindness, a relief. A mercy.

God’s mercy surrounds us. Sometimes I hardly think about it. Other times, I experience it lifting me out of troubled waters, or providing relief from soul numbing shame, or gently reminding me that I am loved.

Perhaps the rest of my journey will be improved if I also consciously soak up God’s mercy, as if it were a cup of cool water.

Oasis

Friday in the Third Week of Lent

God’s angels shall bear you in their hands,

lest you dash your foot against a stone.

Psalm 91:13

Some days the calm and content settle into my lap without any effort on my part to seek them out or make them be. Pure gift.

On days like these I am aware of joy welling up in my soul as if from a deep spring. I feel close to God, as if we are taking a walk together, enjoying one another’s conversation and company.

Midway through the Lenten wilderness, I drink deeply from this oasis, resting in the hands of holy angels, astonished that this is the place I find myself.

Humility walk

Thursday in the Third Week of Lent

Teach me your way, O Lord, 

And I will walk in your truth.

Psalm 86:11

It is a beautiful day to be outdoors. And honestly, even as this thought takes hold, I examine it. Surely the beauty or goodness or advantage of being outdoors does not depend on the weather. It seems to me that touching the air or ground on any day is vital to being human.

Going for a walk, taking off my shoes and standing on holy ground, connecting my body to the earth from which it was formed, remembering that I am dust. These actions remind me that I live and move and have my being within God’s creation. Not outside it. Not over it.

I am in constant need of this reminder, this humility. Walking in the wilderness, walking through Lent, walking in God’s truth. 

Spacious light

Wednesday in the Third Week of Lent

Your word is a lantern to my feet

and a light upon my path.

Psalm 119:105

I cannot help but feel my spirits lift as I walk into the bright afternoon sunshine. With the time change, my body clock is of course off, and I keep thinking it is earlier than it is. I expect the sun to be going down as I arrive home. Instead, the day feels stretched out, as if I have all the time in the world.

I linger in this feeling of expansiveness. I take note. Because of course God’s time is not kept by clocks or governments, or limited by appointments, or curtailed by the start of the next zoom meeting.

If my life is in God’s hands, then my soul can abide in God’s time. I soak up this sense of spaciousness, knowing it will be there when I need it along the road.

Gushing life

Tuesday in the Third Week of Lent

God split the hard rocks in the wilderness
and gave them drink as from the great deep.
Psalm 78:13

Yesterday it rained; today I look out on a landscape covered with snow. Water is amazing, the only element that can naturally be found in all three states: solid, liquid and gas. And, as I learned recently, the only element that expands when it becomes a solid. Snow crystals take up more space than water droplets, ice takes up even more space.

Even before creation was called into being, God’s wind swept over the face of the waters.

In the wilderness, God gives people water from the hard rocks. Along the road, Jesus offers people living water—a gift that will become within them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life. On my Lenten path, I will keep my eyes open for the expansive gift of God’s thirst assuaging promise.

Safety

Monday in the Third Week of Lent
 
Restore us, O God of hosts;
show us the light of your countenance,
and we shall be saved.
Psalm 80:3
 

There is comfort in being safe from the coming snowstorm. And even while I think on this, I am aware of so many who are not safe in a storm. Extreme weather, unrest, emotional outbursts, financial crisis. Our world, whether global or limited to a single person’s environs, seems pummeled by these and many more troubles.
 
Where are safety and security to be found?
 
And this is why faith. At times I cling to it. Other times I rest in it. Many times it is the faithfulness of others that carries me. And even when my faith is weak, God remains faithful.
 
Out of faith comes action, reaching out to offer safe harbor to others. And as the snow begins to fall, I know once again that resting in God is where I find restoration, and the place from which I can reach out, and my only hope.

Release

Friday in the Second Week of Lent

When my mind became embittered,

I was sorely wounded in my heart.

Yet I am always with you;

you hold me by my right hand.

Psalm 73:21, 23

There is a certain way the air feels before it snows. Damp, weighty, still. The sky, impenetrable luminescent gray rather than dark, seems a bulging sheet holding back the precipitation until it is time. Air and sky holding their breath. Waiting.

When the snow comes it will be beautiful, a sweet release of pent-up energy and hoarded moisture.

I am mindful that I too am waiting. I have begun my yearly ritual of honing in and rooting out and letting go. Yet each day brings its hesitation. Maybe I will not continue. Maybe I will willfully try to hold fast to an indeterminate status quo.

What have I hoarded in my heart that God can make beautiful once I release it? 

Presumption

Thursday in the Second Week of Lent

Gregory of Nyssa

Above all, keep your servant from presumptuous sins;

let them not get dominion over me;

then I shall be whole and sound,

and innocent of a great offense.

Psalm 19:13

When my friend gifted me with the small plant, all neat in its container with moss and tiny rocks covering the surface of the dirt, I was thrilled. “I love bonsai!” I exclaimed, noticing two tiny new leaves on one branch.

I did not know if it was really a true bonsai, but I savored the idea of it and hoped I could keep it alive. I watered it gently, and for weeks I kept my eyes on those two budding leaves. Until I realized it had been weeks. The plant remained as it was. Perfect in its artificial glory. I swear even to this day the leaves feel real. 

Sinfulness can begin like this. Holding on to presumed truths. Savoring an idea past the point of, well, the point of it. Neglecting to discern true life.

And addressing sin often begins with reassessment; what is the truth, the heart of the matter.

Having reevaluated my not-at-all-a-true-bonsai I enjoy it for what it is. A gift. A bit of brightness in my workspace. An invitation to contemplation.

Firmament

Wednesday in the Second Week of Lent

O Lord, your word is everlasting;

it stands firm in the heavens.

Psalm 119:89

I am forever conscious of the sky. I notice the quality of light in the morning, and like to sit by the east-facing window to watch the world unfold. I take note of the clouds during the day, and how the sun weaves its light in and around them. They might be wisps or puffer coats or gauzy layers splashed purple-orange by the evening sun. Or maybe the day is wrapped in fog, everyday shapes disguised with shimmering cloaks.

In the middle of the night I contemplate the landscape altered by the moon’s reflected light, or only know that it and other celestial bodies continue in their paths while they remain hidden from me. The heavens, populated with the stars beyond number and orbits we will never trace, separated from the waters by God in an act of creation, contain God’s word. Once spoken, never ceasing, firm in the firmament.

My footsteps remain on the earth. My wilderness journey embedded in the ground, in the dust out of which I am made. And always the sky covers me, God’s word a mantle, a comfort, a shelter, a promise.

Afternoon tea

Tuesday in the Second Week of Lent

Blessed be the Lord day by day,

the God of our salvation, who bears our burdens.

Psalm 68:19

True confession: sometimes I eat cookies during Lent. 

True wisdom: sometimes the best spiritual practice is afternoon tea. 

Holy napping

Monday in the Second Week of Lent

 

Our sins are stronger than we are,

but you will blot them out.

Psalm 65:3

 

 

The cough lingers. Like so many people I know, I have succumbed to this winter’s tenacious cold. I am thankful that I do not really feel unwell. Other than my need to nap. And honestly, napping goes in the wellness category.

 

The urge to power through when I am tired, when I am sick, when I am emotionally spent is also tenacious. I’m not sure I know anyone right now who thinks they get enough rest. Perhaps the fact that the Holy One created and sanctified rest should alert me to the fact that the enemy is behind my tendency to undervalue it.

 

Once again I am humbled by my need of God; and thankful that it is God who blots out my restless sins, and who gives rest to the weary.

Uncovered

Saturday in the First Week of Lent

When I called, you answered me;

you increased my strength within me.

Psalm 138:4

The piles of papers on my desk have been weeks in the making. Well, to be honest, months. Today I finally seem to have the time and the brain space to make them go away. Sorting. Shredding. Filing. Discarding. Labeling.

The surface of the desk appears. I make no new “later” piles. And in the midst of it all, I find paperwork from 2019 that is now needful. It was never really lost. Perhaps, like many things from before the pandemic, it was waiting to rediscovered. 

In many ways I find that my spiritual life too is being uncovered, the surface of my soul appearing once again. Practices and attitudes I have collected over that past three years are ready to be sorted, some shredded or discarded. Others filed away for another time of need. 

I was never really lost along that way. And God will not let go of me now. The Lenten road is prepared for me, then and now. To give me strength and sustenance. As I make my way through the wilderness to rebirth.

Kind gestures

Friday in the First Week of Lent

I waited patiently for the Lord,

God stooped to me and heard my cry.

Psalm 40:1

My receipt comes with a piece of chocolate, a lovely offering from the postal worker who cheerfully helped me with a complicated transaction. I am pleased and almost feel like a kid receiving a lollipop after getting a shot at the doctor’s office. Encounters with bureaucracy seldom go smoothly, much less pleasantly. After all, earlier in the day, one of my kids called me for mom support after a not-at-all congenial encounter with the DMV in another part of the country. 

A small gesture can have a big impact on someone. For better or worse. 

I think of the Lenten road barely begun, my pace not yet regular or even familiar. The way ahead will require patience and care and consideration for myself and for others. And I am so grateful that I know that God is about loving-kindness.

Vast

Thursday in the First Week of Lent

I know every bird in the sky,

and the creature of the fields are in my sight.

Psalm 50:11

The tracks in the fresh snow attest to the deer, many deer, that move through this field on a regular basis. Their path, well-known and well-trodden to them, is not visible to me without this snowy revelation.

The deer also remain hidden--in every season. How many other paths and patterns are unknown to me? How arrogant of me to think that my movement through creation should be singular and noteworthy.

The landscapes and creatures and movements known to God and unknown to me are vast.

As I wander through the enormity of Lent, may I remember and take note of all that belongs to God. 

Brilliance

Wednesday in the First Week of Lent

God looks down from heaven upon us all,

to see if there is any who is wise,

if there is one who seeks after God.

Psalm 53:2

The brightness of the morning sun intensifies as it bounces off the snow, and I adjust my seat by the window so the glare is not in my eyes. Light, reflection, brilliance. Amazing gifts from God.

The particles of light travel a vast expanse to glance across my book and pool in my lap.  The particles of God’s loving-kindness also cross time and distance to dance around me.

Wisdom keeps me from looking directly at the sun or even into the reflected sunlight. And I know I could not bear to face straight into God’s holy countenance. I am too small, of too little account, too human.

Nevertheless, wisdom keeps me seeking after God’s presence. In the light. In the morning. In the snow. In the encounters that will illumine my path this day.