Email to Psalms Group preparing for Sunday, 2/14/21
Dear Psalms friends,
Brrrrr!! This frigid time, despite the warmth of Valentine love and friendship and fun, is our preview for Lent, the upcoming penitential season. On February 17, Ash Wednesday begins our deep dive into our Triune God through intensified prayer, fasting, and generosity. Our Bishop Todd Hunter points out that the key question for discipleship is always (yes, Bishop Todd said “always”), “What do you want?”
So, for your Lenten discipleship 2021, what do you want? Look at the vision of life in God that you see fleshed out in the teaching and life of Jesus Christ. Do you want that kind of life? All of it, including the way of the cross? What obstacles/idols keep each one of us from coming to a place where we say in our hearts, “For me to live is Christ”? What needs to be added or subtracted for me to join in Jesus Christ’s life in the world for the sake of others? What do I want for Lent 2021? What do you want for Lent 2021?
I want to love the Father and talk with him like Jesus did, to listen to the Father like he did. I want to participate with my companions in Jesus in confessing personal and corporate sin. I want to receive the grace of repentance that changes me and the church from the inside out—deep, internal transformation, ongoing and lasting—into Jesus-like love. I want his Holy Spirit’s empowerment to clear out clutter in me and my environment, to free me for intensified love and service for Him for the sake of the world.
Like the psalms of lament, Jesus Christ’s love acknowledges both wounds and sins and offers hope for disintegrated lives and parts of lives. Jesus died for human hurt as well as for human sin. Reading and praying the Psalms in Jesus Christ helps us put our questions that he is the answer for into words.
This Sunday we will focus on Psalm 102, one of the 7 penitential psalms— Psalms 6, 32, 38, 51, 102, 130, 143. Notice how Psalm 102 draws you to Jesus, makes you think of him. What are the questions raised for you by Psalm 102 thatJesus and His Body the church are the answer for? Notice Psalm 102’s place in Book 4 of the Psalms. What echoes of Psalm 90 do you see in it? Notice how the penitential mood of Psalm 102 recurs in Psalm 106.
Read the Kellers’ reflections on pp. 249-252 in The Songs of Jesus and look for a Psalm 102 lesson in tomorrow’s e-mail. May God help us discern and ask for what we really want in Lent 2021.
In His deep love,
Toni