Epistle Reading: Romans 10:8b-13
For Sunday, February 17, 2013—Lent 1
The position of the Gospel and the Epistle posts are intentionally flipped this week in that this post serves as both an introduction and a challenge.
We are moving into the season of contemplation and self-examination, if not the season of preparation for baptism as it was in the early church. Still it remains a season for renewal of our baptismal vows, in principal, and for forming deeper commitments, relationships, and understandings.
It’s a season for drawing “nearer my God to Thee.”
We are all trying to communicate the very-near “word of faith” to our congregations. I am sure many of you are having Lenten studies, extra services enriched, perhaps, by elaborate denominational materials; while others maybe just have the sanctuary open Wednesday’s for prayer.
Giving Up or Adding To?
Moving from the devotional to the sacrificial, some folks have again determined that in order for them to better recognize the nearness of the word, it’s best to push some other stuff further away. They’re giving things up again this year—chocolate, swearing, alcohol, and soda are the most popular. Facebook placed sixth in a recent analysis from Twitter’s API. As for Twitter’s own place among the giving up stuff for Lent tweets? Numero uno.
Others have taken the opposite tack of adding things in Lent things like volunteering, daily prayer or scripture reading, eating healthier, or working out. Along those lines at THQ we thought that adding a hard question for the whole season of Lent might be helpful.
So, this post isn’t a questioning of the First Sunday of Lent epistle so much as it is our questioning of this entire season for drawing near. As we read and question the Lenten texts over the next six weeks we thought it might server to have a large question in the back of our minds to maybe point us in a particular direction as we move ever nearer, pericopally speaking, to the death and resurrection of Jesus the Christ.
Below the Fold
Before I go any further I would like to welcome the Rev. Dr. Mark Stenberg as my partner in the curation of THQ. In particular, Mark has agreed to join me in the weekly Beyond the Blog video response to the texts. Tony Jones was a great partner, but try as he might he can’t do everything.
Mark and I started House of Mercy church together (along with Rev. Debbie Blue, who is also a contributor to THQ). He is a gifted scholar and social critic and one of my favorite people to questions the text with. So if you haven’t checked out the weekly Beyond the Blog video response lately or ever give it a watch. You do have to scroll down below the fold.
The Hardest Question
All that to say, I asked Mark what he thought the hardest question for Lent would be and he said it is the same as the hardest question for Easter: How do we prepare for something that we could never conceive of?
If Lent is the season of preparation for the death and resurrection of God incarnate, the season of preparation for the celebration of God entering history and allowing God’s creation to murder God; for God incarnate to rise—taking up death with him; and then to use that murder and resurrection as the means of the salvation of everyone—then it is an impossible task.
While we might have words and theologies to try to explain the event it is utterly incomprehensible. How do you prepare for something you could never conceive of?
Russell Rathbun is a preacher at House of Mercy in St. Paul, Minnesota, the author of Midrash on the Juanitos (Cathedral Hill Press, 2010) and the curator of The Hardest Question.
