More on Getting Ready for Lent

February 4, 2021

Our season of Lent begins in two weeks. Let me share a few simple ways you can get ready to participate. 

1. Put three dates in your calendar please! 

• Plan on being at our online church service on Zoom on Sunday, February 14th, at 10:00 a.m. when during the sermon, I’ll introduce the season, which continues each Sunday and each week thereafter until Easter. As usual, we always upload our service to YouTube and to our website after they are over, if another time or platform is preferable for you.
• Also that weekend, plan on picking up your Lent in a bag from us (see dates, times, and locations in Lent announcement below). It will have a paper copy of the season’s Bible guide and several objects which will be part of the spiritual practices we invite you to throughout the season. You can also pick up a bag for a friend or ask someone to pick one up for you. And if you need us to drop one off or mail one to you, please fill out this form.
• If you are able, join us for a very short online Ash Wednesday service, on Zoom on Wednesday, February 17th at 7:00 p.m.

2. Let us know if you’re grieving the loss of a friend or a loved one who has passed away, whether their death was this year or sometime last year. Send their name and date of death to Kim Messenger – kim@reservoirchurch.org. At our Ash Wednesday service, we will remember in prayer the people we love who have died in recent months. When a pastor places ashes on our head at the start of Lent (or this year, when we place them on our own heads), we are remembering our weakness and mortality – that we sin and that we die. And we are asking God for forgiveness for our sin, and also for courage to follow Jesus with hope in these short lives of ours. We find it fitting this year to also remember our grief on this occasion.
3. Begin to consider what is most important to you this year, as well as any ways you may have forgotten who you are. We’ll be guided this Lent by some of the Bible’s prophets, who speak of issues very relevant in our lives and society. Three quotations from Jerome Berryman, founder of Godly Play, have guided me in recent months as I’ve been preparing for this season.

 “Prophets are people who come so close to God, and God comes so close to them, that they know what is most important.”
We hope this Lent to lean toward God and to discover or rediscover what is most important. 

“Prophets are people who know the most important things. They know which way to go. They are the ones who show us the way.”
Our church doesn’t try to define what should be most important for all of us; we don’t tell you exactly which way to go. But we believe that as we lean toward God in prayer and listen to the prophets, the Spirit of God will be our teacher and guide and show us each some of what is most important as well as show us the way forward. 

“Sometimes people forget who they are. They hide from God and pretend God isn’t there.”
Lent is an opportunity to explore the intersection of finding ourselves and finding God again. 

One part of Reservoir’s vision for becoming the Beloved Community is empowering wholeness, love, and justice in people and communities, promoting whole life flourishing. Lent is a season where we focus together on our relationship with God and invite God to grow that wholeness, love, and justice within each of us. I look forward to sharing this season together.

Peace,

Steve