Happy New Year! I know it is the beginning of February, but not only is this the first issue of our newsletter since December, but also January was a mediocre month, at best, and I’d like a re-do.
It is a great time for it, too. We’ve had a whole month of attempting at varying degrees to fulfill New Year’s resolutions we made at the end of December. Maybe you’re the type of person who has stuck to your new diet or your new running plan or your new meditation/prayer/self-care schedule and … I can’t relate to you. I see you. I hear you. You matter. I have no idea how you do that. Maybe you went in with great intentions and have stumbled along the way and have beaten yourself up about it. You’ve tried a few more times and have since given up on the habit you were trying to form. I can relate to this. I’ve done this. But not this year.
This year I didn’t even bother making any resolutions. I have enough life experience to know it just isn’t going to happen. But that doesn’t mean I never try to make myself better. I just decided January 1 isn’t the right time to try and also that making huge promises to myself is just going to lead to disappointment.
This is where my February New Year comes in. By February 1, I’ve gotten through the craziness of the holidays, which usually extend a couple of weeks after Christmas for me because I can’t celebrate with anyone until after my church obligations are finished. I’ve had some time to rest and relax, to catch up on some day-to-day chores that were ignored in favor of Christmas preparations, and the sun is finally staying out long enough that it is noticeably lighter out than it was on January 1.
In our church year, the season of Lent usually begins sometime in February. For centuries, Christians saw Lent as a season of fasting - of giving things up. This would be another time someone would try to quit eating junk food or quit smoking. Just like a New Year’s resolution, this type of fast comes with varying degrees of success, but with the added pressure, for some people, of Christian guilt. Oof.
That’s not how we look at Lent. During Lent, we aren’t meant to force ourselves to share in Christ’s suffering, but we are looking for ways to make room in our lives for the risen Christ we will meet at Easter. This might mean refraining from things that get in the way of our relationship with God, but it might also mean taking a moment every once in a while to be mindful of God's presence in various parts of our day. Once we start to remember God’s love in our lives all the time, our actions with other people should start to reflect that love, and we should treat ourselves with the same love, too.
The best part is, this isn’t a resolution - it is a practice. It is something we are working toward, and if we don’t do it all the time, we can try to do it again. No failed promises to beat ourselves up about.
What does God’s love look like in your life? How can you reflect that love in the way you treat other people? How can you reflect that love in the way you treat yourself?
Yours in Christ,
John Johns, Music Director
Lent begins February 14. Various resources for the season are available in the Gathering Space at church.