Today is Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent, the forty-days of introspection and repentance leading up to the sorrow of Good Friday and the joy of Easter. Even for non-Christians it's a good time to reflect on the ways we have not lived up to the standards we strive to live by and to make amends to those we have hurt or wronged by our actions. For Christians, the standard is the love of God, and the one before whom we kneel in repentance is first and foremost God himself.

We received the sign of ashes this evening. As we filed across the front of the church, Pastor Chris inscribed the sign of the cross with oil and ashes on our foreheads. Sitting in ashes or applying them to ones body is a sign of grief and contrition reaching back thousands of years. It's an external sign to signify an internal reality.

That's one way we grow during Lent; we grow in self-understanding and humility as mature persons who accept responsibility for our own misdeeds.

But that's only part of the growing and only part of Lent.

The purpose of the fasting or going-without that is associated with Lent is the removal of external distractions so that we can focus on the God who loves us and gave himself for us. In his meditation this evening, Pastor Chris focused on these words of the Apostle Paul,

I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. (Letter to the Christians in Ephesus.)

My prayer is that I -- and you -- may grow in our knowledge and love of God this season of Lent.



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