“Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts!” Psalm 139:23 EVS
The beginning of March marks the beginning of the Lenten season.
Growing up in a Catholic household, we were always aware of Lent as a time of fasting and repentance. It was a time of humbling our souls before the Lord and being more mindful than usual of how Jesus suffered and died for our forgiveness and the forgiveness of all mankind.
As an adult I became part of a newer church stream. We were more focused on the wonders of the resurrected Christ and the victory that we are promised when our lives are joined to God through faith in His Son, by the Spirit. Joy and assurance was our hallmark and to be sure this buoyant faith launched a thousand ministries and in this outpouring we saw the gospel go literally all over the world. No place was too far, no country was closed. If God spoke “Go” in our prayer closet, money or not we were packing our bags and heading to the airport within weeks.
And so a world is won. And is being won. For it is the resurrection power of Jesus that opens every door. His life brings us life. In Him there ARE no shut doors.
However there is one thing we need to be mindful of, and that is in order for there to be a resurrection, there must first be a death.
Hence we come back to Lent. A time when we as a community decide to mark a season of fasting and prayer and repentance. A time of dying to ourselves so that the resurrection life of Jesus might truly be made manifest through us so that we can truly be the light and the blessing to our generation that Christ has appointed us to.
Death to ourselves. Death to our rights to our own opinions. Death to our sinful attitudes. Death to our judgments of others. Death to selfishness. Death to pride. And in that dying we yield each part of ourselves into the care of His grace, knowing that He is able to transform us into the likeness and image of His Son.
Search me, O God. Try me and know my thoughts!
If ever there were a time when we as ‘the Church’ needed to search our hearts and to allow God to try our thoughts, it is now.
Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God.
As we trust Him and yield to Him, surely He will bring life out of death and set us on the way everlasting.
~ Debbie Ecker
