This time of the year always reminds me of a major shifting of gears as we move from the "Season of Light", culminating yesterday with the Transfiguration of Jesus on the mountaintop, to the beginning of Lent on Ash Wednesday this week. That's a major shift! To go from that mountaintop experience, seeing Jesus in all his glory, to, within a few days, wearing ashes, reminding us of our mortality, that we are from dust and to dust we shall return. Ouch. That's not the most pleasant thing to think about. After all, we have little reminders of that everyday...especially as we get older. (Insert your own list here.) But while that's not something we like to dwell on, there is also something freeing about just accepting that reality and not having to try to live in denial about it, as the world does. Instead, as Christians, who can look ahead to Easter, we know that the Last Word is not Death, but Life. So we begin the countdown, starting on Ash Wednesday, where we stop dancing around the reality of our mortality, look death in the eye, put on ashes, then look down the road to the rest of the Story.
Here are some particulars about Ash Wednesday and the season of Lent. During this season there will be 2 services each Wednesday, one at 11am and one at 7pm. On Ash Wednesday the services will include the imposition of Ashes. There will be no meals on that day. On the following Wednesdays in Lent, the service times will be the same, 11am and 7pm, but a light lunch will follow the morning service, and a light supper will be served at 6pm, preceding the 7pm service. The setting for the evening service will once again be Holden Evening Prayer. The messages during these weeks will be based on "conversations" with some of the objects surrounding Jesus' last days and hours: the Thorns, the Robe, the Nail, the Spear, the Shroud. If they could talk, what would they say? Come and see.
And finally, speaking of shifting gears, the TIME CHANGE is this coming weekend! So, move your clocks ahead one hour on Saturday or you'll miss church (or come in at the end of worship) this coming Sunday!
Have a blessed week. Peace and Joy, Pastor Jack Diehl +
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