LENT! LENT? LENT.

The Lenten season is upon us. Tonight, March 5, begins the Lenten season with Ash Wednesday. Today we will begin with the imposition of Ashes at 6:45pm followed directly afterwards with the Divine Service at 7pm. (And then on March 12, 19, 26 and April 2 and 9 Join us for a meal at 6:00pm followed by our Midweek services at 7:00pm.)

The question might be though, why even go to these services? Lent seems like such a dower time of the Church year to so many. Why wouldn’t the Church focus on making me happy? Why would we want to go around moping talking about repenting all the time? Yes, Lent is an intensified focus upon repentance, but that doesn’t make it a sad time of the year. Rather it is a focus upon what Christ has come to do. Indeed, Jesus first words he says in Mark 1:15, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.” Luther echoing this says in the first of the ninety-five theses, “When our Lord and Master Jesus Christ said, “Repent” (Mt 4:17), he willed the entire life of believers to be one of repentance.”

So repentance is a good thing, for only believers can truly repent. The Augsburg Confession states, “Strictly speaking, repentance consists of two parts. One part is contrition, that is terrors striking the conscience through the knowledge of sin. The other part is faith which is born of the Gospel, or the Absolution and believes that for Christ’s sake, sins are forgiven. It comforts the conscience and delivers it from terror” (AC XII, 3-6)

Did you catch that? Repentance comforts the conscience! How awesome is that! So the season of Lent with it’s focus upon repentance is actually comforting for as we go through this season we hear all the more clearly why Jesus has come and that he has rescued us! It bring comfort because faith clings not to what my hands offer, but by what his hands offer. The forgiveness of sins. This is what faith clings to.

The Word Lent comes from the Latin word which means spring. It originally was the intensive time of examination and preparation for the culmination of the two-year-long period of catechesis for the Catechumenate as they were about to be baptized and added to the Church at Great Vigil of Our Lord. (Saturday night before Easter) And then it grew as a period for all the Church for all people to prepare for the blessed mystery of Easter with the Resurrection of our Lord.

You are cordially invited to join the saints here at Hope Lutheran Church. If Wednesdays do not work for you, our sister church, Shepherd of the Hills Lutheran Church, in Horseshoe Bend has her midweek service at 5pm followed by the meal afterwards.

Our Sermon Series is titled the “Hands of the Lord” as we focus in on all the ways that he serves us, and that we need what he comes to do for us–to spread his hands out and to die for you and me.