lent

After a crazy weekend away, in the midst of a crazy day... I've been thinking about lent today... saying it's starting tomorrow. I'll try to blog some of my thoughts over the next few weeks in relation to lent but in the meantime, here's a random collection of quotes and things i've been thinking about...

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God of all seasons,
in your pattern of things
there is a time for keeping
and a time for losing,
a time for building up
and a time for pulling down.
In this holy season of Lent,
as we journey with our Lord to the cross
help us to discern in our lives
what we must lay down
and what we must take up,
what we must end
and what we must begin.
-Book of Common Order
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May this lent be for you
a time of addition as well as subtraction,
a time of commission as well as omission.
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My prayer for the Christian church is that God might awaken in us a hunger for himself—a new fasting. Not because we haven’t tasted the new wine of Christ’s presence, but because we have tasted it and long, with a deep and joyful aching of soul, to know more of his presence and power in our midst.
-John Piper – A Hunger for God
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Lent can become a time when material things are put again in their proper secondary position; when we see in the spiritual the unconquerable forces of life. It can become a time of self-examination, when we reflect upon our present position in the pilgrimage and check our directions. It can become a time of personal readjustment, not through mental resolutions to do better but through yielding ourselves afresh to the God who demands to be obeyed. And it can become a time when, by following the battered path to Calvary, we identify ourselves once again with the Saviour who makes all things new.
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“Lent is supposed to be a time when we review our spiritual life, think again about what it means to be a follower of Christ, reset the compass of our discipleship and prepare ourselves to celebrate the Easter festival. But often we just give up biscuits”
(Stephen Cottrell, I Thirst, p. 12)

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Father in the life of Jesus you have shown us the way.
Give us his spirit of self-discipline;
Lead us more deeply into the way of the cross.
Before his hands were stretched out on the cross,
They were stretched out in love to children, women and men.
May your way of the cross be our way
That we, too, may stretch out our hands in love to all.

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In repentance and rest is your salvation
In quietness and trust is your strength.
Isaiah 30:15