Thursday, February 18, 2016
VIDEO
My heart has heard you say, “Come and talk with me.”
And my heart responds, “Lord, I am coming.”
And my heart responds, “Lord, I am coming.”
Psalm 27:8(NLT)
Our
home’s curbside appeal is often centered more around liturgical colors than
HGTV’s Property Brothers. This season
has our purple-draped cross adorning the outside wall near the front door. The cross announces this season of Lent –
preparation for suffering, death, and, finally, resurrection!
For
someone raised in a Christian tradition which did not include an emphasis on
Lent, or other more formal practices of faith expression, my love of worship,
including the likes of Ash Wednesday ashes, Good Friday, and the discipline of
lectionary daily readings, could not have been expected.
Why
would someone raised on “free-tradition” hymns, extemporaneous prayers and
sermons love unison and responsive readings, and hymns of Isaac Watts? Why would corporate confessions and singing
the Gloria Patri send chills up and down my spine? And, further, why would I love all that
enough to have the whole neighborhood look at our house and yard like the only
thing missing is a steeple?
The
simple answer is that I spend a lot of time in that yard and I love the visual
reminders of the Psalmist’s response to God – the God who wants us to come
close; Lord, I have heard your call, and I’m coming. Every time I come home I drive up and see
that cross on the rock and think of an empty tomb.
I’m
just an average guy with the attention span of a mosquito, and I need all the
visual reminders I can get. Because,
while I am average, and sinful, and my heart is, as the song-writer has it, prone
to wander, Lord I feel it; prone to leave the God I love[2],
I am also travelling an extraordinary journey towards an eternal home that is
anything but average. And I’m going
there to serve, love, and fellowship with an unparalleled God who loves me with
an everlasting love and kindness.
So
Lent, for me, is all about keeping that perspective.
All
the liturgical wanderings through written prayers and sermons, call and response,
and dirty foreheads in pre-spring rituals are my help in keeping close to the
One who called me to be close enough to hear his heart beating-out that melodic,
incomparable cadence:
I love
you; love me…I love you; love me…I love you; love me.
For You Today
Can you hear it? Can you hear the cadence of love?
My heart has heard you
say, “Come and talk with me.”
And my
heart responds, “Lord, I am coming.”
Lent is singing!
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