“Listen then to what the parable of the sower means: When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in their heart. This is the seed sown along the path. The seed falling on rocky ground refers to someone who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away.  The seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, making it unfruitful. But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hears the word and understands it. This is the one who produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.”.

• Matthew 13:18-23

In you, Lord my God,
    I put my trust.
I trust in you;
    do not let me be put to shame,
    nor let my enemies triumph over me.
No one who hopes in you
    will ever be put to shame,
but shame will come on those
    who are treacherous without cause.
Show me your ways, Lord,
    teach me your paths.
Guide me in your truth and teach me,
    for you are God my Savior,
    and my hope is in you all day long.
Remember, Lord, your great mercy and love,
    for they are from of old.
Do not remember the sins of my youth
    and my rebellious ways;
according to your love remember me,
    for you, Lord, are good.

• Psalm 25:1-7

But whoever loves God is known by God.

• 1 Corinthians 8:3

“Perhaps it seems rather crude to describe glory as the fact of being ‘noticed’ by God. But this is almost the language of the New Testament. St Paul promises to those who love God not, as we should expect, that they will know Him, but that they will be known by Him (1 Cor. 8:3). It is a strange promise. Does not God know all things at all times? But it is dreadfully re-echoed in another passage of the New Testament. There we are warned that it may happen to anyone of us to appear at last before the face of God and hear only the appalling words, ‘I never knew you. Depart from Me.’ In some sense, as dark to the intellect as it is unendurable to the feelings, we can be both banished from the presence of Him who is present everywhere and erased from the knowledge of Him who knows all. We can be left utterly and absolutely outside-repelled, exiled, estranged, finally and unspeakably ignored. On the other hand, we can becalled in, welcomed, received, acknowledged. We walk every day on the razor edge between these two incredible possibilities. Apparently, then, our lifelong nostalgia, our longing to be reunited with something in the universe from which we now feel cut off, to be on the in-side of some door which we have always seen from the outside, is no mere neurotic fancy, but the truest index of our real situation. And to be at last summoned inside would be both glory and honour beyond all our merits and also the healing of that old ache.
“And this brings me to the other sense of glory-glory as brightness, splendour, luminosity. We are to shine as the sun, we are to be given the Morning Star. I think I begin to see what it means. In one way, of course, God has given us the Morning Star already: you can go and enjoy the gift on many fine mornings if you get up early enough. What more, you may ask, do we want? Ah, but we want so much more-something the books on aesthetics take little notice of. But the poets and the mythologies know all about it. We do not want merely to see beauty, though, God knows, even that is bounty enough. We want something else which can hardly be put into words-to be united with the beauty we see, to pass into it, to receive, it into ourselves, to bathe in it, to become part of it.”

• C.S. Lewis, Preparing for Easter (from Reflections on the Psalms, chapter “The Fair Beauty of the Lord”)

Boilerplate

First, the concept of Lent is the preparation for what is to come, the anniversary of Christ’s death and resurrection between Good Friday and Easter Sunday.  But in some denominations, the entire time from Advent, the anticipation of Christ’s coming (remembrance of His birth but preparation for His return) to Easter (Christ’s resurrection from the dead)…  This bracket of time is a celebration of the entire life of Jesus Christ on earth.  Christ’s conception to His ascension and on to the Holy Spirit coming upon the Apostles at Pentecost can be presented and celebrated from early December until Pentecost Sunday.

Many denominations only focus on Christmas and Easter, or maybe the entirety of Holy Week from Palm Sunday to Easter, and then may or may not focus on Pentecost.

But for those that recognize Lent, the Lenten season in many denominations has an element of fasting.  Sadly, this is done as Jesus teaches us not to do.  They make a big deal out of it when we should do it in private, something just between us and God.  But that tradition stems from the forty days of fasting that Jesus did in the wilderness after His baptism and before His ministry started.  The Lenten season is kicked off on Ash Wednesday.  And after forty days, we reach Palm Sunday, the beginning of Holy Week.  The concept of ashes is symbolized by at least one denomination having a cross painted on their forehead in ashes, sometimes from burning the palm fronds from the previous Palm Sunday the year before.  Again, that draws attention to the fact that they have started their fast.  But they are also announcing that they are Christians.  There is good and bad there.

So, when we are in the Lenten season, what should we focus on?  It depends.  We should focus on Jesus, but we might want to focus on our service to God.  What can we do better?  How can we spread the Gospel?  From Conception to Pentecost…  His mission was completed on earth, but He left us with something to do.

As for the Lewis book, it comes from a compilation of Lewis’ writings, edited by Zachry Kincaid.  In the book, there is a devotion, of sorts, from Ash Wednesday through Easter Sunday, the Lenten Season.  Each devotion contains suggested Scriptures and a writing of C.S. Lewis.

Last year, I used my free time posts, Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday afternoons (EST) to correspond with that day’s devotion in the book.  I am picking a day that I did not use last year.

Discussion

C.S. Lewis speaks of the everyday.  Those things that happen all the time.  There is no fanfare with mowing the lawn, washing dishes, doing laundry, or taking out the garbage.

Okay, I have engaged in fanfare when washing the dishes and finally checking the last of the e-mails.  I do not know how many times I have decided that my body is spent and then I see that I have 100 e-mails in my inbox.  My half empty brain says, “Tomorrow morning for sure.”  I turn the computer off and walk upstairs to the kitchen.  Unfinished projects are on the kitchen table, and the sink has a couple of plates in it.  I had warmed leftovers that day.  My less-than-half empty brain says, “Tomorrow for that, too.”

Then, two days later, with the sink full and 250 e-mails in the inbox, I hardly get any writing done because those chores are not getting done by themselves.

Tomorrow had finally arrived, and I will celebrate those events.  I will bring glory to God because He let me know that those things needed doing, and I could glorify Him by doing them.

Sure, we want to have something glorious to do.  I don’t want to go crazy with the danger, but do you want to glorify God by slaying a dragon or do you want to glorify God by unclogging the toilet?

By the way, I had my first clogged toilet last week.  Three years after my wife passed, and this clog was a momentary thing.  No need for a snake.  The plunger was fine.  It seemed to be an annual thing before she passed, but then, there were two of us instead of one.

And having written two posts about the Triumphal Entry for yesterday, and my question from two paragraphs ago…  I wonder if there has ever been a movie or mythological medieval tale where the handsome knight goes out and slays the dragon and frees the princess.  The townsfolk give the knight a triumphal entry back into town.  The knight gathers up a large bouquet of flowers from all that was thrown in his direction and he takes the flowers home to his wife.  His wife smiles and says, “I’ll swap you those flowers for the plunger.  The toilet is clogged again.”

I have a feeling the movie audience would love it for comic relief.  Because that’s life.  We cannot always be the handsome knight on the trusty steed, riding into town.  We may have that image of ourselves, but we are closer to the image of the wife not even offering a kiss – just handing us the plunger and telling us which bathroom needs our attention.

Yet, we praise God in the process.  When you have had to call the plumber and tell him to come with his snake, seeing the water go down after several attempts to clear the clog…  I don’t know about you, but I have offered some of the most sincere praises to God in those times.

In this week, Holy Week, I spend a lot of time thinking of the crucifixion.  My Dad fussed at me about that.  Our Savior is not a Savior nailed to a tree, but a Savior who died, was buried, and rose from the dead.  But I know that I sin.  I know that I have sinned a lot in my life.  And I find it helpful to realize the agony Jesus went through for me.  He loves me that much and I owe Him everything, the everyday and the glorious day and all those in between.

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.