closer

A weekly Rector’s Notes article, February 24, 2020

The invitation of Lent is to draw closer to God.

This is an invitation to a means of preparation for what is a taxing, emotionally draining, and emotionally overwhelming experience in Holy Week.

This is an invitation to remind ourselves once more where the focus of the church is, where she finds her centering point, her grounding, upon which all of our tradition has been built.

This Sunday we will explore how we can accept this invitation of Lent to draw our own prayer lives closer to God, and in that practice, find our whole beings drawn closer to God.

Lenten practices are varied and plentiful (the phrase “lenten practices” brings back about 84 million results on google) but they all should be serving one purpose: removing barriers in our life that keep us from having a close, personal relationship with God. Whether you are giving something up or taking a discipline on, the point of these actions is to draw us back to God.

This is why the season of Lent begins in ashes on Ash Wednesday. This reminder of our mortal lives in this creation is a means of connecting us to our creator and reminding us of the relationship we have to God and one another in this creation.

Throughout Lent, we are treated to stories of the power of Jesus’ ministry leading into the events of Holy Week so that we can place into context how Jesus’ ministry continues to influence and shape our lives.

In Holy Week, we are drawn into the intimate moments that finalized Jesus’ ministry with us, the intimate moment of death and mourning, and the joyous resurrection that comes on that Easter morning.

My hope for you this year is that you will feel closer to God through a dedicated Lenten practice, whatever it may be, and that through our continued interaction and education as a community of faithful believers, we can draw one another closer to God through our shared experiences.

Worship with us this Lent.

Learn with us this Lent.

Move closer to God with us this Lent.