Lent: Remembrance and Hope
Deuteronomy 26:1-11
Lent – Remembrance and Hope
Rev. C.R. Brooks, PhD
Each year the Israelites remembered, by the offerings of the first fruits of the land, God’s deliverance of them from Egyptian slavery. They recalled to their children and children’s children their establishment in the promised land. Their fathers and mothers were wandering desert people who were caught in cruel bondage in Egypt (26:5). God, the Lord, had heard their voices and seen their affliction. In mercy, God freed them “with signs, and with wonders (26:8).” God freed them by miracles that frustrated the most powerful army in the known world, Pharaoh’s army. God took them through the Red Sea. Then God provided for them as he took them through a terrifying wilderness and gave them a place of safe dwelling. And each year as they recalled such a great salvation, God poured hope into them. God is Hope. With God they had hope in a future that would be shaped by the God of mercy. A wondrous Almighty God who again and again still delivers people who once chose bondage to sin and death back into in relationship with God.
Lent is a time of remembrance in which we recall the great “signs and wonders” by which God redeemed us. Even when the world around us seems like a wilderness we have God. We have Hope. We have all that is possible to have. We look to the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. In Jesus, God has given us an inheritance greater than any earthly land. God has freed us from sin and death for life abundant and eternal. We live with the sure Hope that nothing can separate us from God’s love. Give up the arrogance to God. Give pride to God. Give self-control to God. Give up loneliness, hurt and pain. Give your joys and praise to God to have more of God possess and overflow your being. So, during Lent, starting with Ash Wednesday, we ask for forgiveness for all of our past behavior, and we bring a gift to God. It is not just a basket of fruit or a dead animal: we are called to bring ourselves, through Jesus’s blood, in a trusting faith to the God who delivers us again and again. Then “you shall rejoice in all the good which the Lord your God has given you” (26:11).
Prayer: Eternal God help us to see beyond ourselves to glimpse afresh that great salvation you have given us in Jesus Christ. Free us to rejoice, to care, to hope, while believing that you will transform the broken and confused fragments of life we have into glory, peace and joy through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
Lent – Remembrance and Hope
Rev. C.R. Brooks, PhD
Each year the Israelites remembered, by the offerings of the first fruits of the land, God’s deliverance of them from Egyptian slavery. They recalled to their children and children’s children their establishment in the promised land. Their fathers and mothers were wandering desert people who were caught in cruel bondage in Egypt (26:5). God, the Lord, had heard their voices and seen their affliction. In mercy, God freed them “with signs, and with wonders (26:8).” God freed them by miracles that frustrated the most powerful army in the known world, Pharaoh’s army. God took them through the Red Sea. Then God provided for them as he took them through a terrifying wilderness and gave them a place of safe dwelling. And each year as they recalled such a great salvation, God poured hope into them. God is Hope. With God they had hope in a future that would be shaped by the God of mercy. A wondrous Almighty God who again and again still delivers people who once chose bondage to sin and death back into in relationship with God.
Lent is a time of remembrance in which we recall the great “signs and wonders” by which God redeemed us. Even when the world around us seems like a wilderness we have God. We have Hope. We have all that is possible to have. We look to the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. In Jesus, God has given us an inheritance greater than any earthly land. God has freed us from sin and death for life abundant and eternal. We live with the sure Hope that nothing can separate us from God’s love. Give up the arrogance to God. Give pride to God. Give self-control to God. Give up loneliness, hurt and pain. Give your joys and praise to God to have more of God possess and overflow your being. So, during Lent, starting with Ash Wednesday, we ask for forgiveness for all of our past behavior, and we bring a gift to God. It is not just a basket of fruit or a dead animal: we are called to bring ourselves, through Jesus’s blood, in a trusting faith to the God who delivers us again and again. Then “you shall rejoice in all the good which the Lord your God has given you” (26:11).
Prayer: Eternal God help us to see beyond ourselves to glimpse afresh that great salvation you have given us in Jesus Christ. Free us to rejoice, to care, to hope, while believing that you will transform the broken and confused fragments of life we have into glory, peace and joy through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
Recent
Archive
2025
Categories
no categories
No Comments