The Presbyterian Church in Burlington, Massachusetts --- 01803

Bible scholar Walter Brueggemann has written about the easy manner in which most active churchgoers in the U.S. receive the gospel:

The gospel is too readily heard and taken for granted, as though it contained no unsettling news and no unwelcome threat. What began as news in the gospel is easily assumed, slotted, and conveniently dis- missed… The gospel is thus a truth widely held, but a truth greatly reduced. It is a truth that has been flattened, trivialized, and rendered inane. Partly, the gospel is simply an old habit among us, neither valued nor questioned. But more than that, our technical way of thinking reduces mystery to problem, transforms assurance into certitude, revises quality into quantity, and so takes the categories of biblical faith and represents them in manageable shapes.

--from Finally Comes the Poet: Daring Speech for Proclamation

I think we’re all responsible at times for this “domestication” of something that has power to shake us to the core and then lift us back up as transformed people. If so, Lent is a time for returning to its power.

The 40 days (not counting Sundays) leading to Easter have taken shape over the centuries as a time to encounter the real and painful realities of our lives, individually and as a human community. It can be a time to allow God to penetrate our pride and defenses. It is also a time for owning our need to heal our relationships with God and with one another; and a time for turning to the age-old disciplines of prayer and service.

And it is a time to hear God’s word, which convicts us but is also ultimate hope! When we really follow the path of Lent, and don’t ignore the darkness of Good Friday, we are as ready as humanly possible for the wild news of Easter, and to be raised and shaped by what is called “gospel”—good news. Nothing, neither our darkest nature nor death itself, can separate us from the love of God.

Lent begins in ashes, and finishes in alleluias! Please plan to be part of our church family’s journey this year, beginning with a service on Ash Wednesday, February 6, at 7:30 p.m. We’ll welcome friends from one or two other Presbyterian congregations.