Would everyone please stand and pray with me?
Almighty God, we come before you on the threshold of this season of Lent and praise your name for all that you have done for us. Help us as we prepare to cope over these next 40 days and guide us in all that You would have us do.
Tonight we raise up the names of people that are in need of your loving and healing touch. . . . . . .
We also come before you in thanksgiving, acknowledging your help and guidance in our lives and the lives of others. Hear our cry of Thanks. . . . . . .
Dear Lord, we wish to follow your traditions and teachings and ask now that you help us in figuring out what mistakes we have made in the past years. Help us speak of our mistakes to You silently so that they are impressed solidly in our hearts. Then help us to make the changes we need to make in order to become more fully involved in our relationship with You. Here us as we confess. . . . . .
We know that you can forgive us Dear Lord and ask now that you will.
We ask all these things in the name of Your only Son and gift to the world. Amen.
This coming Wednesday begins a month and a half of a remarkable journey of events in our Christian history. Even though we traditionally begin this journey on Ash Wednesday, many believe the three days before should be days of total fasting and abstinence, while others celebrate a Carnival or Mardi Gras during these three days before and have a festival and lots of food in anticipation of the fasting that is supposed to take place for the next 40 days.
Q: Why is Lent forty days long?
A: Because forty days is a traditional number for discipline, devotion, and preparation in the Bible. In Exodus 24:18 and 34:28, we read that Moses stayed on the Mountain of God forty days. In Numbers 13:25, the spies were in the land for forty days. 1 Kings 19:8 tells us that Elijah traveled forty days before he reached the cave where he had his vision. Jonah 3:4 says Nineveh was given forty days to repent. And most importantly, prior to undertaking his ministry, Jesus spent forty days in the wilderness praying and fasting which is found in Matthew 4:2.
The season of Lent is not full of happiness and many of us try to avoid the thoughts and emotions connected to this time. It is a period when we are supposed to focus on our shortcomings, our sins and confess all the wrongs we have done in the past. It is a time to repent and seek the forgiving power of our Lord and Savior.
We start off this season with the symbol of ashes. Ashes have represented a period of mourning and repentance throughout Jewish history. Many references are made to sackcloth and ashes even in the New Testament. Ashes remind us of how unworthy we are and how much we have done wrong. We don’t like to look at mistakes we have made. They are frightening and surely don’t make us feel good about ourselves.
But, if we don’t take a good, honest look at what we do, how can we ever hope to improve and become closer to our God? If we don’t acknowledge our mistakes, then we are destined to repeat them again and again. So, while this may be a time of sadness and disappointment, it can become a positive, worthwhile time in our lives. By recognizing our wrongs, we can build on them and make ourselves better and better each year in our relationship to God.
Many of us would sooner skip over all of this and wait for the celebration of Palm Sunday. This is a joyous, happy time. We get our Palms on Sunday and wave them in the air and celebrate. And then comes Easter where we celebrate the resurrection of Christ. These are the times we like during these 40 days of Lent. These are the happy times.
Between the celebration of Palm Sunday and Easter, there are two other significant days we pass through on our journey. There is Maundy Thursday. This is the time when we look back and relive the night of the betrayal of Jesus and the last meal with His disciples. This is a time when we need to put ourselves in the place of Judas and ask how many times in this past year have we betrayed Christ. How many times have we collected our few pieces of silver and sold out to the world and turned our backs to God?
Then there is Good Friday. I used to wonder why we call it ‘good’ when this was the day that Christ was crucified. This is the day when Christ was put to death by the world. This is the day when even Peter denied knowing Christ. Every time we do something against God, we are among that crowd that stood there in front of Christ and shouted ‘Crucify Him’. There are truly times when we are no better than anyone standing in that crowd wishing that Christ would just go away and let us live our lives the way we want. Just crucify Him and let me get on with my life.
And how many times have we acted like Peter, pretending we don’t even know this man they called Jesus? How many times, when we should have spoken up for good, did we stand there silently? How many times have we watched an injustice and did nothing to change it? How many times have we had the opportunity to speak to a friend about Christ, but walked away saying nothing? Are we any better than Peter was at that moment when he said ‘No, I don’t know this man’?
Do you think Christ wanted to spend 40 days in the wilderness, giving up most of the good food he had eaten at all the friendly houses He visited? Do you think Christ wanted to sleep in the wilderness and give up a nice warm, soft bed to sleep in? Do you think Christ wanted to give up a friendly cup of wine and cheerful talk with His friends?
I don’t think so. No more than we want to give up our favorite food, chocolate, television, games, alcohol or other things for this season of Lent.
But Christ needed to center Himself with God. He needed to communicate His frustrations and fears, knowing that death was just around the corner. And the best way to do this was to isolate Himself and remove the everyday comforts. Christ needed to get down to the basics and become humble in front of God, giving control to the only one who is in control. Christ needed to get real with God.
And we are asked to do the same thing over these next couple of weeks. We need to get our egos out of the picture. We need to crawl in the dust and ashes of this world and talk honestly and openly with God. We need to tell Him of all the things we have done wrong and seek His forgiveness. We know we will get His forgiveness, but we must first acknowledge that we have done wrong. We must put aside our foolish pride and strip ourselves bare in front of God. We must give control back to Him and admit that we have failed on our own. We must admit that we are needy and that we really are not as perfect as we think. We must seek to place our needs, our fears, our failures, our pain, our hopes and our very lives in the hands of God. We must allow and accept God’s grace.
So this journey over the next 40 days is really a Spiritual journey where we give up our self centeredness and open our souls completely to God. The journey begins in darkness and despair, traveling through prayer and repentance into the light of that glorious Easter morning when our faith and life are renewed. The journey ends when we can truly acknowledge what Christ has done for us by His death on the Cross. He died in our place, for the forgiveness of our sins.
Amen.
A couple of weeks ago, I asked Kate and Danny if they liked the music we play on Saturday nights and they both kind of wrinkled up their noses and said ‘Not really’. Kate brought me a couple of CD’s after that and said there were three songs I should listen to. One of those songs is called Never Underestimate My Jesus. The words to this song are so in line with what we are talking about tonight that we are going to listen to it now.
- - -
For The Moments I Feel Faint
Never Underestimate My Jesus
Am I at the point of no improvement?
What of the death I still dwell in?
I try to excel, but I feel no movement.
Can I be free of this unreleasable sin?
Never underestimate my Jesus.
You’re telling me that there’s no hope,
I’m telling you you’re wrong.
Never underestimate my Jesus.
When the world around you crumbles,
He will be strong, He will be strong.
I throw up my hands, oh the impossibilities.
Frustrated and tired, where do I go from here?
Now I’m searching for the confidence I’ve lost so willingly,
Overcoming these obstacles is overcoming my fears, oh no.
Never underestimate my Jesus.
You’re telling me that there’s no hope,
I’m telling you you’re wrong.
Never underestimate my Jesus.
When the world around you crumbles,
He will be strong, He will be strong.
I think I can’t, I think I can’t,
But I think You can, I think You can.
I think I can’t, I think I can’t,
But I think You can, I think You can.
Gather my insufficiencies, and
Place them in Your hands,
Place them in Your hands
Place them in Your hands.
Never underestimate my Jesus.
You’re telling me that there’s no hope,
I’m telling you you’re wrong.
Never underestimate my Jesus.
When the world around you crumbles,
He will be strong,
Never underestimate my Jesus.
You’re telling me that there’s no hope,
I’m telling you you’re wrong.
Never underestimate my Jesus.
When the world around you crumbles,
He will be strong, He will be strong,
He will be strong,
He will be strong,
He will be strong.
. . . I think this song points out exactly where many of us are tonight.
Am I at the point of no improvement?
What of the death I still dwell in?
I try to excel, but I feel no movement.
Can I be free of this unreleasable sin?
. . . We get stuck, not knowing what to do on our own, but we plod along, getting nowhere. We try to do better, we try to get rid of our guilt, but nothing happens.
I throw up my hands over the impossibilities.
Frustrated and tired, where do I go from here?
Now I’m searching for the confidence I’ve lost so willingly.
Overcoming these obstacles is overcoming my fears, oh no.
. . . Life often seems impossible. And sometimes we blame God for our own failures. Most of us can think back to a time when we were pretty confident of where we were going in life, but that passes and we find more obstacles than we do open road. We develop fears and doubts as time keeps passing us by. We can overcome these obstacles, but to do so, we have to face our fears and we don’t want to do that. So we walk around day after day repeating “I think I can’t, I think I can’t”.
Then the song says:
Gather my insufficiencies and place them in Your hands.
. . . This should be your prayer for the next 40 days. Every morning and every evening talk to God and ask Him to take all the things we hate about ourselves and all the mistakes we have made and place them in His hands. Take them off your shoulders and let God carry your load.
Never underestimate my Jesus.
You’re telling me that there’s no hope,
I’m telling you you’re wrong.
Never underestimate my Jesus.
When the world around you crumbles,
He will be strong, He will be strong.
Thanks Kate!
