This Lent, don't just give up, take on!

During the Lenten season that starts this Wednesday, why not take on a meaningful discipline that will enrich your daily life and may continue to do so beyond the 40 days plus Sundays? Here are a few suggestions:

• Make a list of people and places, events and things that are important to you, and focus on one entry each day in prayer. (You'll need 46 items to cover Ash Wednesday through Holy Saturday.) Possible sources: your address book; Christmas cards received last year; your church directory; photos on your shelves or computer; your e-mail contact list; favorite cities and vacation spots; colleagues and merchants with whom you do business; friends and mentors from the past; in-laws and neighbors; your friends' parents; your parents' friends.....
  
  
• Before each Sunday, read and meditate on the appointed lectionary readings. At church, notice how the elements of the service – music, sermon, and prayers – carry out the theme. Perhaps write a few notes in your worship bulletin to remind you of your impressions. After church, find some time to reflect, noting topics you'd like to research or discuss. A great resource is http://divinity.library.vanderbilt.edu/lectionary/
  
  
• Get a blank book or a stack of large index cards. (An inexpensive spiral-bound children's sketch book works perfectly.) At the close of each day, divide one page into four quadrants: draw one line down the center vertically, and one across the center horizontally. Using the four sections, list something you experienced or achieved that day from each of these four categories:
  
  1) something I gave to or did for another;
  2) something I learned or created;
  3) a gift or blessing I received;
  4) a concern I release to God.
  
  You may choose to write more or less, as time and inspiration dictate.
  
  
• Go on a diet from negative thoughts.* Fill your mind instead with positive affirmations, either through Bible verses or your own words. Write such useful phrases on eye-appealing cards, and keep them in a small basket on your desk or wherever you often could use some "redirection."
  
  
• Just as you address God with thanks and praise before you offer your humble petitions, begin with a word of praise or thanks before any time you offer someone a word of critique or revision. Continue this discipline beyond Lent, forever.
  
  
• Forgive, forgive, forgive. Forgive others for wrongdoing against you, both blatant and perceived. Forgive people for not fulfilling the ideals you've projected onto them. Forgive yourself for letting yourself down. Forgive, forgive, forgive. By all means, don't shy away from standing up for yourself wherever you can work for a just resolution. But after hurts and slights have long since turned into lingering, crippling baggage, let it go. If God can pour salvation onto our broken world, why must we persist in passing sentence? Take a break from the judgement seat and accept your role as an agent of God's healing grace.

__________

*For the idea of going "on a diet from negative thoughts," thanks to the great metaphysical writer Louise L. Hay.

Bridge Out

What a wild ride the past few weeks have been. My computer crashed, cutting off my usual command center. At the same time, an old friend, lately out of touch but eternally dear at heart and permanently iconic in my life story, died suddenly at age 53. It's as though the expected bridge from a few weeks ago to now was washed out and I've taken a detour, one day's walk at a time.

Isn't this what we all do? Even at the times when we presume to plan our days and weeks, even when the auto-pilot of ordinary days suffices to take us from morning to night and back again, an infinity of variables is at play. In the words of a wonderful old speech, we walk in ways we know not. We take a step and seek guidance, take another step and thank God for being sustained. In an environment where our own vision is inadequate, faith reaches forward to grip the opposite cliff.

On Wednesday we'll enter the season of Lent, a time weighed down with traditions of moping along to the tune of a dismal dirge, and of sacrificially giving things up for the 40 days, often replacing them with a pitiful air of deprivation instead of an intensely private discipline of self-denial. It's easy to end up resenting the whole experience.

I prefer instead to address Lent as a journey. On a broad scale, it's a time to take a step and give thanks, take another step and seek guidance, reach beyond ourselves to grasp with faith something beyond our vision.

Jane Stimpert White

IN FOND REMEMBRANCE OF
Jane Stimpert White

(1955-2009)

O let the Son of God enfold you
With His Spirit and His love,
Let Him fill your heart and satisfy your soul.
O let Him have those things that hold you,
And His Spirit like a dove
Will descend upon your life and make you whole.

O come and sing this song with gladness
As your hearts are filled with joy,
Lift your hands in sweet surrender to His name.
O give Him all your tears and sadness,
Give Him all your years of pain,
And you'll enter into life in Jesus' name.

Jesus, O Jesus, come and fill Your lambs,
Jesus, O Jesus, come and fill Your lambs.