Lent Four - The Turning

Of all the ways to enter into our texts this week the sense of the turning point, or awakening, or turning towards home, or the process of becoming the new creation, are all ways of referring to the moment – or multiple moments - in the journey when we come to our senses and turn towards our true home. (Lent Four. Joshua 5:9-12; Psalm 32: 2 Corinthians 5:16-21; and Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32.)

You may like to read my reflections from three years ago.

Last week we explored holding in holy tension the images of the great banquet and the response that was required of us to accept grace and allow it to do its work in us. In many ways this week is a closer look, a focusing in if you will, at this moment of responding.

In the story of the entrance into the Promised Land is this curious but really important story of the chosen people needing to prepare themselves for actually living in the place they have been searching for all this time. Specifically by circumcision for those born over the last forty years and a change of diet from manna from heaven to the fruit of the land they are entering into for everyone. Even the Promised Land requires change from us. (Joshua 5:9-12)

While not all change might be described as entering into the Promised Land there is a sense that entering into the conscious presence of the Holy One does require intention, preparation and change. And Psalm 32 is very psychologically accurate in its description of the process of needing to confess or come to understand our own part in our suffering so that we are freed to become a new creation. And of course the parable of the prodigal sons and generous father is one of the most powerful stories of coming to one’s senses far from home and turning towards our true home or destination.

If we are considering Lent as not only the story of the journey of Jesus towards Jerusalem but also of our soul’s journey to fullness then we can take great inspiration from these images of “coming to” and “turning towards”. Grace is all around us and awaiting us, but until we have realised where we are and how far that is from where our true home is, or how our face is turned in the wrong direction, then we will not enjoy the experience of grace.

For some of us at some stages of our life our “ coming to” is far from home after a wild adventure or misadventure – the stuff of testimony in a revival tent. But for some of us our “awakening” is apparently close to home when we realise that while living a sensible or good life it is not ours, or that our heart and mindset is wrong, so that we too need a changing of our heart and mind to be in right relationship. (Which is the definition of repentence – to have our minds changed both in the sense that we make a different decision and that our minds are changed by encounter with the living God.)

Of course this is not only an individual moment of awakening and decision making it is a community journey as we are reminded by the reading from Joshua - it is the people of God who discern where they are in the journey and undertake preparations for the last steps of the homeward bound journey. Lent is a wonderful opportunity to remember that others are on the same journey as ourselves and that there are some things we can only experience and achieve as community.

At this moment in church and human history we might wonder what will it take to awaken us as a people, to have us come to our senses, about how far from the joy of the generous father’s presence, have we strayed? How did we get to the place where we are? How did we become keepers of niceness and orderliness rather than prophets of hope and inclusion for the least and the lost? How did we get to be so burdened by managing property and protocol rather than having no where to lay our heads and seekers on the way? And how did we get to known as an institution that abuses the vulnerable rather than those who would rather pluck out our eyes than offend the little ones? We are well passed the time for an awakening, a reawakening, a becoming a new creation! And yes there are signs of green shoots but maybe we should be praying and preparing for a time of coming to and turning towards the kingdom.

And if we the community of Christ awaken what ripples we might send throughout the broken entrenched way of being citizens of self interest rather than citizens of the kingdom of heaven? If we attend to the gospel that is good news for the poor what change might that ignite in our world? Or what trend or tendril of growth in our world might we as church want to put our energy and enthusiasm behind? All good Lent questions.

Even so, come Lord Jesus the Christ, bringer of good news for those far from home and those wearied by good works, come awaken us to joy and hope for all.

This is my work informed by everything I have heard, read and experienced. I am indebted to the wisdom of others. This week I am particularly grateful to:

Rev Elana Keppel Levy @ www.somuchbible.com

John T Squires @ An Informed Faith www.johntsquires.com