IntroductIon - storage.cloversites.comstorage.cloversites.com/bloomchurch/documents/Lent2011.pdf ·...

IntroductIonLent. The word “Lent” elicits different reactions from different people. Some cringe, remembering the religious drudgery of their childhood. Others recall with fondness the seasons of special devotion and activities that yearly rekindled their love for the person of Jesus Christ. For some the word bespeaks a sense of dry traditionalism. And still for others, the word is an empty symbol—meaning and signifying very little.

Overtones notwithstanding, the word “Lent” comes from an old English word meaning simply “spring.” Like the season, Lent is about the yearly return to the life of God made known in Jesus Christ. It’s about God’s call to us to journey out of our brokenness, our hurt, and our fragmentation and into his wholeness, healing, and completeness. It’s about allowing the “new creation” reality Paul spoke of (2 Cor. 5:17) to take hold in a deeper way in our lives.

Lent is about Life. God’s Life. That is, it’s about Jesus.The booklet you hold in your hand is to help you make room for God in a unique way during this Lenten season. It consists of the following things:

1) A morning reading from the Psalms. The book of Psalms is the great prayer book of Scripture, used by saints down through the ages to help orient the soul to God. So much can be done with the Psalms. You can simply read them, or you can sing them; you can pray them, or you can silently meditate on them. Above all, remember that the Psalms are poetry and prayer. So linger with them as you would good poetry. Let your soul sink deep into their meaning, and meet God there.

2) An afternoon reading from the Gospels. Lent is nothing if it is not a radical reorientation to the person of Jesus, and reading the Gospels helps us to “story ourselves” into the narrative of Jesus of Nazareth. We imagine ourselves among the crowds who followed; we feel the warm wind from the Sea of Galilee brush our faces as He preaches; we sit at His feet among the attentive disciples, listening to His words; we feel His agony in Gethsemane. And as His story becomes our story, we find our story takes on a new shape.

3) An evening reading from a classical Christian author. Richard J. Foster, author the classic work, Celebration of Discipline, contends that the wide River of historical Christian orthodoxy is comprised of Six Streams representing the six great traditions of the Christian faith:

- The Contemplative Stream (representing the prayer-filled life) - The Holiness Stream (representing the virtuous life) - The Charismatic Stream (representing the Spirit-filled life) - The Social Justice Stream (representing the compassionate life) - The Evangelical Stream (representing the Word-centered life) - The Incarnational Stream (representing the sacramental, God-soaked, life)

According to Foster, a robustness of Christian experience is found in appropriating the richness of all of these great traditions into our lives, rather than one at the exclusion of the others.

Each of the first six weeks we’ll focus on one of the Streams, and each of the evening readings for that week will come from an author representing that Stream.

In addition, we’ll have a few suggested practices at the beginning of each week that can help you enter into the experience of that Stream.

We want to encourage you to enter into the morning, afternoon, and evening rhythm of devotion, and as you do your readings, read with your heart and your will, not just with your mind. We’ve tried to keep the readings as short as possible so that the reading itself does not occupy all of your time. This will allow you to really read with your heart and will—reading and rereading, praying through the texts, saying them aloud, looking at them from different angles, singing them, whatever! We want you to make use of the readings as pathways of communing with God.

In addition, we’ve provided space on the side of each page for you to journal. Here you can write thoughts, prayers, reflections, or confessions. Heck, you could even draw in this space. We encourage you to make use of it however you see fit. Use it to tell the truth about what God’s doing in you, to give expression to the movements of His grace in you as you journey towards resurrection.

One final thought: long journeys are always the sweetest when we take them in the company of good friends. We encourage you to grab a couple of your friends as this journey begins and commit to meeting regularly to discuss, celebrate, and embolden the work of God in your life during this Lenten season.

May you experience God’s transformative power this Lenten season as you make room in your life again for Him.

Pastors Mark & Ed Gungor

1Richard J. Foster. Streams of Living Water: Celebrating the Great Traditions of the Christian Faith. HarperSanFrancisco: 1998.

Week 1 The Journey Begins

The journey to Easter begins with Ash Wednesday. On this day we remember that our lives are finite—that is, they have a definite beginning and a definite end. So much depends on how we approach this reality. Many in our culture are afraid of death. They run from it. They deny it. They do their best to delay it as long as possible. We try so hard to maintain our grip on life, but the reality is that it will ultimately, for all of us, slip away.

Everything, of course, depends on what you do with that reality. Those with no hope beyond the grave will predictably live their lives in fear or greed. But Christians believe that Christ’s resurrection dealt Death the decisive deathblow and therefore is not to be feared.

So Christians don’t approach death like those without faith—in a “go for all the gusto you can” desperation or in cowering fear. Instead, they seek to let their lives be poured out as worship to God. Ash Wednesday helps us remember that God calls us to live our lives in such a way that we can say truly that our lives were “poured out, but not wasted.”

This Week’s Stream - The Prayer-Filled Life

This week we turn our attention to the riches of the Contemplative Stream. This Stream addresses the crying need we all have in our souls for intimacy with God. As the great St. Augustine said, “Our souls are restless till they find rest in thee.” The Contemplative Stream calls us into a rich life of prayer and communion with God, knowing that it is God, and only God, that satisfies.

Practicing the Contemplative Stream

Here are some suggestions for practicing the Prayer-Filled Life this week:

1. Spend 5-10 minutes each day this week in silence. Our lives are filled with pure noise. It makes it hard to hear. Use this time to attend to God. He may say nothing. That’s okay. Love attunes itself to what it loves, regardless of what it gets in return.

2. Spend 5-10 minutes praying the same prayer, like, “Abba Father, I belong to you,” or, “Lord, help me remember I’m always in your presence.” Let the thinking and the saying of the prayer lead you into the experience of it.

3. Journal. Few things help us identify the hand of God in our lives better than journaling.

4. Write out an original prayer. Thoughtfully writing out your words to God is a powerful way of communing with Him.

Day 1 - Ash Wednesday

Morning Reading:Psalm 1

Afternoon Reading:Matthew 4:1-11

Evening Reading:In meditation we should not look for a “method” or a “system,” but cultivate an “attitude,” an “outlook”: faith, openness, attention, reverence, expectation, supplication, trust, joy. All these finally permeate our being with love in so far as our living faith tells us we are in the presence of God, that we live in Christ, that in the Spirit of God we “see” God our Father without “seeing.” We know him in “unknowing.” Faith is the bond that unites us to him in the Spirit that gives us light and love.

- Thomas Merton

Prayer for the Day:I begin this journey in your presence and under your grace, Lord Jesus. Grant me the experience of being “buoyed up” by that same grace. Amen.

Journal

Day 2 -Thursday



Evening Reading: Just as our flesh is covered by clothing, and our blood is covered by our flesh, so are we, soul and body, covered and enclosed by the goodness of God. Yet, the clothing and the flesh will pass away, but the goodness of God will always remain and will remain closer to us than our own flesh. God only desires that our soul cling to him with all of its strength, in particular, that it clings to his goodness.

- Julian of Norwich

Prayer for the Day:Help me live in and bask under your penetrating goodness, Lord Jesus, and help me remember that your love for me is closer to me than I am to myself. Amen.

Journal

Day 3 - Friday



Evening Reading:In solitude, we come to know the Spirit who has already been given to us. The pains and struggles we encounter in our solitude thus become the way to hope, because our hope is not based on something that will happen after our sufferings are over, but on the real presence of God’s healing Spirit in the midst of these sufferings. The discipline of solitude allows us gradually to come in touch with this hopeful presence of God in our lives, and allows us also to taste even now the beginnings of the joy and peace which belong to the new heaven and the new earth.

- Henri J. M. Nouwen

Prayer for the Day:Lord, like your disciples, bid me come. And when you bid me, help me hear. And when I hear you, help me follow. Amen.

Journal

Day 4 - Saturday


Afternoon ReadingMatthew 4:23-25

Evening Reading:Prayer is listening as well as speaking, receiving as well as asking; and its deepest mood is friendship help in reverence. So the daily prayer should end as it begins—in adoration.

- George Buttrick

Prayer for the Day:Thank you for calling me into your friendship, Lord Christ. I adore you. Amen.

Journal

Day 5 - Sunday


Afternoon ReadingMatthew 5:1-12

Evening Reading:The determined fixing of our will upon God, and pressing toward him steadily and without deflection; this is the very center and the art of prayer. The most theological of thoughts soon becomes inadequate; the most spiritual of emotions is only a fair-weather breeze. Let the ship take advantage of it by all means, but not rely on it. She must be prepared to beat to windward if she would reach her goal.

- Evelyn Underhill

Prayer for the Day:Christ has died. Christ has risen. Christ will come again. Help me fix my will on you today, Lord Jesus. Amen.

Journal

Day 6 - Monday



Evening Reading:One of the early Christian writers describes the first stage of solitary prayer as the experience of a man who, after years of living with open doors, suddenly decides to shut them. The visitors who used to come and enter his home start pounding on the doors, wondering why they are not allowed to enter. Only when they realize they are not welcome do they gradually stop coming. This is the experience of anyone who decides to enter into solitude…

- Henri J. M. Nouwen

Prayer for the Day:My heart is so loud, Lord Jesus, the distractions so many. Still the turmoil in my soul to a gentle whisper, and there let me sense your presence. Amen.

Journal

Day 7 - Tuesday



Evening Reading:No one can believe how powerful prayer is and what it can effect, except those who have learned it by experience. It is important when we have a need to go to God in prayer. I know, whenever I have prayed earnestly, that I have been heard and have obtained more than I prayed for. God sometimes delays, but he always comes.

- Martin Luther

Prayer for the Day:Thank you that you always hear, God, and always love, and always respond when we cry. Hear my prayer today!

Journal

Week 2Whereas during the first week of Lent we began by thinking about the reality of death and the hold that the fear of death exerts in us, during the second week we turn our attention towards the reality of sin and how it spoils and sullies our lives by fooling us into believing things about God, ourselves, and others that simply aren’t true.

The story of Nicodemus (which begins this week’s Gospel readings) beautifully captures what it looks like when the liberating Word of the Gospel overhauls a person’s life. Robert Webber, commenting on this story, writes “Nicodemus is told to cease defining himself by the world of his own making. He is to deny his own present situation with such a decisive repudiation and to affirm Jesus with such a life-changing embrace that this change can be described (only) as a new birth.” 2

May you find grace to repudiate the power of sin and to redefine your life in light of the person of Jesus this week.

This Week’s Stream - The Virtuous Life

This week we turn our attention towards the Holiness Stream—the Virtuous Life. This Stream addresses the loss of virtue in our culture and calls us to remember that God is not just interested in our happiness, He’s interested in our holiness—our character.

As the Scripture says, “Be holy, because I am holy” (1 Pet 1:15). The Holiness Stream orients us towards the holiness of God lived out in virtuous lives.

2Robert E. Webber. Ancient-Future Time: Forming Spirituality Through the Christian Year. BakerBooks: Grand Rapids. 2006. P. 108.

Practicing the Virtuous Life

Here are some suggestions for how you can practice the Holiness Tradition this week:

1. Pray for the Holy Spirit to clean “the inside of the cup.” Jesus said that real transformation begins from the inside out. When the insides are clean, the outside follows.

2. Resist temptation with the Word of God. Sin blinds us to what is real and what God makes available to us in Jesus. Quote Scripture (tell the truth over yourself and over your situation) when you find yourself tempted—as Jesus did—and see what happens.

3. Try fasting. Often, fasting reveals what’s ugly inside of us, which is what makes it SO uncomfortable. But when we fast, we learn to break the will and center it on God.

4. Practice speaking the truth. We often vacillate wildly between quietism and pandering. Practicing speaking the truth in love this week. And if you can’t, then bite your tongue and pray for grace.

Day 8 - Wednesday


Afternoon Reading:John 3:1-10

Evening Reading:The Divine One is himself Good, whose very nature is goodness. This he is and he is so named, and is known by this nature … Certainly, whoever pursues true virtue participates in nothing other than God, because he is himself absolute virtue.

- Gregory of Nyssa

Prayer for the Day:Father, today I acknowledge that you are pure goodness and virtue, and that goodness and virtue come only from you. Let your nature rest on me today so that I may share in your holiness. Amen.

Journal

Day 9 - Thursday



Evening Reading:If we are not our own, but the Lord’s, it is clear to what purpose all our deeds must be directed. We are not our own, therefore neither our reason nor our will should guide us in our thoughts and actions. We are not our own, therefore we should not seek what is only expedient to the flesh. We are not our own, therefore let us forget ourselves and our own interests as far as possible. We are God’s own; to him, therefore, let us live and die.

- John Calvin

Prayer for the Day:Help me come into the light today, Lord Jesus, and let me live and die to God alone. Amen.

Journal

Day 10 - Friday



Evening Reading:To make us happy [religion] must show us that a God exists whom we are bound to love; that our only true bliss is to be in him, and our sole ill to be cut off from him. It must acknowledge that we are full of darkness which prevents us from knowing and loving him, and so, with our duty obliging us to love God and our sin leading us astray, we are full of unrighteousness. It must account to us for the way in which we thus go against God and our own good. It must teach us the cure for our helplessness and the means of obtaining this cure.

- Blaise Pascal

Prayer for the Day:Jesus, you are the light of the world, and you alone are the cure for the darkness within and without. Let your light shine into the darkness of my soul. Amen.

Journal

Day 11 - Saturday



Evening Reading:No one is completely free of temptations because the source of temptation is in ourselves. We were born in sinful desire. When one temptation passes, another is on its way. We will always have temptations because we are sinners who lost our original innocence in the Garden. Many have tried to escape temptations only to find that they more grievously fall into them. We cannot win this battle by running away alone; the key to victory is true humility and patience; in them we overcome the enemy.

- Thomas a’ Kempis

Prayer for the Day:Lord Jesus, you said that we cannot bear fruit unless we remain in you. Teach me to remain, and help me bear the fruit that you desire. Amen.

Journal

Day 12 - Sunday



Evening Reading:The devout, therefore, are people who do not live to their own will, or in the way and spirit of the world, but only to the will of God. Such people consider God in everything, serve God in everything, and make every aspect of their lives holy by doing everything in the name of God and in a way that conforms to God’s glory.

- William Law

Prayer for the Day:Christ has died. Christ has risen. Christ will come again. You are the ruler of the universe, Lord Christ, the Living One. And to you I owe my life—body, mind, and spirit. Make me completely and totally yours. Amen.

Journal

Day 13 - Monday



Evening Reading:Let us firmly resolve not to lose the battle we fight. For if the devil sees that we are willing to lose our life and our peace, and that nothing can entice us back to the first room, he will soon cease from troubling us. But we must be resolute, for we fight with devils, and thus, there is no better weapon than the Cross.

- Theresa of Avila

Prayer for the Day:Grant me, O God, that firm and steely resolve that whatever may come, I shall neither give up, nor give in, nor surrender, and let me in so doing stand under the sign and grace of the Cross of Christ. Amen.

Journal

Day 14 - Tuesday



Evening Reading:This is true perfection: not to avoid a wicked life because like slaves we servilely fear punishment, nor to do good because we hope for rewards, as if cashing in on the virtuous life by some business-like arrangement. On the contrary, disregarding all those things for which we hope and which have been reserved by promise, we regard falling from God’s friendship as the only thing dreadful and consider becoming God’s friend the only thing worthy of honor and desire. This, as I have said, is the perfection of life.

- Gregory of Nyssa

Prayer for the Day:Let your love, Lord Jesus, drive me to deny everything that is not you, and let my soul rise in praise and adoration for you—the only true God and pure Goodness itself. Amen.

Journal

Week 3We pick up where we left off last week by focusing on repentance. The word “repentance” carries ugly overtones for some people, conjuring images of Bible-thumping televangelists or fire-and-brimstone preachers demanding public displays of contrition. “Repentance?” we think, “Not for me!”

But while the word repentance is admittedly overlaid with some bizarre connotations, in it’s basic form it’s a beautiful word. The Greek is metanoia—it literally signifies simply a change in orientation, in how we process and understand our world and ourselves and it entails a deep commitment to live out of that renewed perspective and vision.

Now, it’s important to note that while the Bible calls us to repent, it’s very clear that repentance is a gift; it is a grace. Paul said, “For the grace of God which brings salvation…teaches us to say ‘no.’” (Titus 2:11-12)

May the grace of God that brings repentance permeate your life this week.

This Week’s Stream - The Spirit-Empowered Life

This week we turn our attention towards the Charismatic Stream—the Spirit-Empowered life. All of us can attest to the struggle of wanting to live for God but not feeling capable.

This Stream addresses that feeling head on, acknowledging outright that while we don’t have the resources to live for God, God does. That is to say, there is power for living available in the Person of the Holy Spirit.

Paul said, “And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you” (Rom 8:11). Only through the immediacy of the Spirit’s power can we live the God-life.

Practicing the Spirit-Empowered Life

Here are some suggestions for practicing the Charismatic Stream this week:

1. Engage God in worship. Sometimes we hold back in worship because we are afraid that anything “genuine” must also be “spontaneous.” But that is simply not true. Throw yourself into worship and see what happens. Sing loudly as you open your heart to God.

2. Invite the Person of the Holy Spirit into your life. This can be as simple as dedicating your prayer time to focusing exclusively on the Holy Spirit. Ask Him to come. Ask Him to produce his fruit in you. Ask Him to make His gifts known in you.

3. Follow promptings. Sometimes we have promptings to speak to or pray for people that we don’t follow. Try following them this week, and see if God the Holy Spirit makes Himself known through them.

Day 15 - Wednesday


Afternoon Reading:Luke 4:14-21

Evening Reading:Deep within is all there is an amazing inner sanctuary of the soul, a holy place, a Divine Center, a speaking Voice, to which we may continuously return. Eternity is at our hearts, pressing upon our time-torn lives, warning us with intimations of an astounding destiny, calling us home unto Itself.

- Thomas Kelly

Prayer for the Day:Jesus, you said that the Spirit would be for us like a stream of water welling up to eternal life. Let the Spirit well up in my life and in my heart. Amen.

Journal

Day 16 - Thursday



Evening Reading:When God finds a soul that rests in him and is not easily moved, he operates within it in his own manner. That soul allows God to do great things within it. He gives to such a soul the key to the treasures he has prepared for it so that it might enjoy them. And to this same soul he gives the joy of his presence, which entirely absorbs such a soul.

- Catherine of Genoa

Prayer for the Day:Holy Spirit, today I yield myself to your presence, which is the presence of Jesus. Let the character and work of the Christ rise up in me today, and let me have the experience of being carried along, strengthened, and emboldened by you. Amen.

Journal

Day 17 - Friday



Evening Reading:Dwell in patience and in peace and love and unity one with another. And be subject in the Power, Life, and Wisdom to God and to one another. That in it you may be as a pleasant field to the Lord God, and as the lilies, the flowers, and the buds feeling the pleasant showers and streams of Life from the living God flowing upon you, whereby the presence and blessing of the Lord God Almighty amongst you all may be felt.

- George Fox

Prayer for the Day:Holy Spirit, apart from you there is no life at all. Clear away what is dead and bring about God’s newness in me. Amen.

Journal

Day 18 - Saturday



Evening Reading:The presence of God which sanctifies our souls is the Holy Trinity which dwells in our hearts when they surrender to the divine will. God’s presence coming to us through an act of contemplation brings this secret union. Like everything else belonging to God’s order and enjoined by the divine will, it must always take first place as the most perfect means of uniting ourselves and God. It is by being united to the will of God that we enjoy and possess him…”

- Jean-Pierre De Caussade

Prayer for the Day:Help me follow your promptings today, Holy Spirit, for you seek what is in accordance with God’s will. Through your empowering presence I will do what pleases God. Amen.

Journal

Day 19 - Sunday



Evening Reading:Friend, it is a wonderful thing to witness the power of God as it reaches to the heart and demonstrates to the soul the pure way to life. Surely the person who partakes of this power will be favored by the Lord. Therefore, we ought to wait diligently for the leadings of the Holy Spirit in everything we do. Thus we will be able to travel through all that is contrary to God and into the things that are of God.

- Isaac Pennington

Prayer for the Day:Christ has died. Christ has risen. Christ will come again. God, give me grace to wait for you. Right here, right now...I wait...I wait...I wait. Well up in me, O Spirit of God, to eternal life. Amen.

Journal

Day 20 - Monday



Evening Reading:I began to see that the Holy Spirit never intended that people who had gifts and abilities should bury them in the earth, but rather, he commanded and stirred up such people to the exercise of their gift and sent out to work those who were able and ready.

- John Bunyan

Prayer for the Day:Help me faithfully use the gifts you’ve given me today, Lord Jesus—not burying them in the earth, not hiding them out of fear, not flaunting them for my own gain, but using them for the good of man and the glory of God. Amen.

Journal

Day 21 - Tuesday



Evening Reading:So everyone strive to be rich in the Life, and the things of the Kingdom that has no end; for the person that covets to be rich in the things of this world falls into many snares and hurtful lusts. Therefore, let the one that buys, or sells, or possess, or uses this world be as if he did not. Let them be masters over the world in the power and Spirit of God, and let them know that they owe no one anything but love; yet serve God in Truth, and one another in their generation.

- George Fox

Prayer for the Day:God, today let me covet nothing but the richness that is the Person of your Holy Spirit. Give me Him, and nothing else. Amen.

Journal

Week 4And so the journey continues…Strengthen us Lord God.

In the liturgical tradition, the midpoint of Lent is punctuated by the fourth Sunday, which is known as “Rose Sunday” (so-called because on this day the clergy wear rose-colored vestments, traditionally signifying joy that the new life of Spring is drawing near).

On Rose Sunday, the emphasis shifts away from repentance and contrition to an emphasis on the healing power of Christ to renew and restore us—to convert us to a totally new way of living.

The opening Gospel reading for this week instructs us on the theme of conversion: the healing of the man born blind (John 9:1-12).

As Webber again notes: “In the early church, baptism and conversion into the church was called an ‘enlightenment.’ It was viewed as the falling away of the scales of blindness, an entrance into a new vision.” The emphasis here is “on what God can do for us when we repent and turn to the grace he offers.”3

May you find grace this week to see your life through the lens of the Christ-event and learn to order your life accordingly.

This Week’s Stream - The Compassionate Life

Appropriately, we turn our attention this week towards the Social Justice Stream—the Compassionate Life. In this stream the passionate call of Jesus and the prophets for justice and shalom in human relationships and social structures is highlighted.

We are reminded that Christianity does not consist merely in an interior, “spiritual” event, but in a new way of approaching our connectedness as human beings.

Practicing the Social Justice Stream

Here are some suggestions for practicing the Social Justice Stream:

1. Seek shalom “at home.” Often our perception of “social justice” is so grandiose that we forget to seek shalom at home, at work, with our family members and friends, etc. So write an encouraging letter to a family member, complement a co-worker, forgive someone who hurt you, etc.

2. Remember the underprivileged in prayer. You’d be amazed at how remembering and praying for the abused or neglected, for example, during your devotional time can mobilize your heart towards justice.

3. Look for an injustice and act. This could be as simple as speaking up for someone who is being mistreated at work or as complex as identifying a global issue and volunteering time or money to help.

4. Learn. We waste so much time in trivialities. Commit this week to spending 30 minutes on the internet learning about an issue. Then ask God what you can do to act.

Day 22 - Wednesday



Evening Reading:The Church is likely to be attacked from both sides if it does its duty. It will be told that it has become “political” when in fact it has merely stated its principles and pointed out when they have been breached. The Church will be told by advocates of particular policies that it is futile because it does not support theirs. If the Church is faithful to its commission, it will ignore both sets of complaints and continue as far as it can to influence all citizens and permeate all parties.

- William Temple

Prayer for the Day:Strengthen me today, Lord Jesus, to advocate for what is right, regardless of the cost. Amen.

Journal

Day 23 - Thursday



Evening Reading:The fear of man brings a snare. By halting in our duty and giving back in the time of trial, our hands grow weaker, our spirits get mingled with the people, our ears grow dull as to hearing the language of the True Shepherd, that when we look at the way of the righteous, it seems as though it was not for us to follow them.

- John Woolman

Prayer for the Day:Today, Lord, I ask that you would give me the courage to fear you and you alone, and thus to stand for what is right. Amen.

Journal

Day 24 - Friday



Evening Reading:Nurture a love to do good things in secret, concealed from the eyes of others, and therefore not highly esteemed because of them. Be content to go without praise, never being troubled when someone has slighted or undervalued you. Remember, no one can undervalue you if you know that you are unworthy. Once you know that, no amount of contempt from another person will be able to hurt you.

- Jeremy Taylor

Prayer for the Day:God, today I pray that you’d give me a love for doing what is good, not because it gets me rewarded or results in my praise, but because you ask it of me. Make your will my delight today. Amen.

Journal

Day 25 - Saturday



Evening Reading:Though we along with millions of other churchgoers are saying that Jesus saves, we ask ourselves if we are not in practice acting as though it were money that saves. We say that money gives power, money corrupts, money talks. Like the ancients with their molten calf we have endowed money with our own psychic energy, given it arms and legs, and have told ourselves that it can work for us. More than this we enshrine it in a secret place, give it a heart and a mind and the power to grant us peace and mercy.

- Elizabeth O’Connor

Prayer for the Day:Give me grace today to place my security in you, Lord Jesus, and to be generous and open-handed with the resources you give me. Amen.

Journal

Day 26 - Sunday



Evening Reading:Sins of omission are avoiding to do good of any kind when we have the opportunity. We must beware of these sins and, instead, be zealous of good works. Do all the good you possibly can to the bodies and souls of your neighbors. Be active. Give no place to laziness. Be always busy, losing no shred of time. Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might.

- John Wesley

Prayer for the Day:Christ has died. Christ has risen. Christ will come again. Lord Jesus, the Scripture says that you have prepared good works for us to do. Grant me vision to see the good you are calling me to work towards my family, my neighbors, and my friends, and help me walk in it. Amen.

Journal

Day 27 - Monday



Evening Reading:When God was merciful to us, we learned to be merciful with our brethren. When we received forgiveness instead of judgment, we, too, were made ready to forgive our brethren. What God did to us, we then owed to others. The more we received, the more we were able to give; and the more meager our brotherly love, the less were we living by God’s mercy and love. Thus God himself taught us to meet one another as God has met us in Christ.

- Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Prayer for the Day:Let me act according to your impulses of love, grace, and forgiveness in me, today, Lord Jesus. Amen.

Journal

Day 28 - Tuesday



Evening Reading:But God has put this Word into the mouth of others in order that it may be communicated to us. When one person is struck by the Word, he speaks it to others. God has willed that we should seek and find his living Word in the witness of a brother, in the mouth of a man. Therefore, the Christian needs another Christian who speaks God’s Word to him.

- Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Prayer for the Day:Lord Jesus, you call us to build our lives on your teaching, your very words. Send people who can model and speak the truth to me into my life, so that my life may be more truly built “on the rock Christ Jesus.” Amen.

Journal

Week 5As we turn the corner towards Easter, our gaze decisively shifts towards the cross of Jesus Christ. In the church of ancient times, the fifth Sunday of Lent was typically referred to as “The First Sunday of the Passion.” Webber notes: “On this Sunday Christians veiled the cross and other objects in the church that symbolized Christ and his work on the cross...Most [scholars] agree that it is a way of communicating the humiliation of God in the voluntary death of Jesus, a symbol to impress upon us the steep cost God was willing to pay for our redemption.”4 This week we remember that while our redemption is free, it is not cheap. The cross cost God dearly.

We begin our Gospel readings this week directing our attention to the story of Lazarus (John 11). Here we see the word of Jesus Christ driving back the deathliness that had gripped Lazarus.

We remember that just as God’s speech made Lazarus alive, so also the very Word of God made flesh, Jesus of Nazareth, makes us alive.

This Week’s Stream - The Word-Centered Life

This week we shift our focus towards the Evangelical Stream—the Word-Centered Life. Of this stream Foster writes: “Jesus, the Christ, came proclaiming the good news of the kingdom of God and was in his very person the embodiment of the good news of the kingdom of God. Jesus was, and is, the living Word of God made flesh among us, standing in his person as the very good news he proclaimed.”5

4Webber, 110. 5Foster, SLW 14.

This stream focuses on encountering and making manifest the radical announcement of God’s good news in Jesus.

Practicing the Evangelical Stream

Here are some suggestions for practicing the Evangelical Stream this week:

1. Read one of the shorter books of the Bible from beginning to end in one sitting. So often our encounters with the Scriptures are like strobe lights—short and brief. We rarely sit and let a prolonged exposure to the Scriptures work its effect on us. Try it.

2. Memorize a Bible verse. The focus and discipline required in memorizing the Scriptures causes their meaning to sink deep in us. It may take awhile, but that’s okay. The goal is slowly embedding God’s words in our souls.

3. Make the good news of God’s kingdom known through your actions. Francis of Assisi famously said, “Always preach the gospel; sometimes use words.” Seek ways to put the gospel on display by your actions this week.

4. Share your faith with someone. While we are called to live the gospel, we are also called to speak the gospel. Dare to announce to someone the good news of God’s reconciling love this week.

Day 29 - Wednesday



Evening Reading:The New Testament is the inspired record of the Revelation—the revelation is the person of Jesus Christ. He moves out of the pages of this Book and meets us with the impact of his person on our per-sons. That impact is cleansing. “Now you are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.”

- E. Stanley Jones

Prayer for the Day:Jesus, meet me in the pages of Scripture today! Amen.

Journal

Day 30 - Thursday



Evening Reading:It is easy to hear Christ, easy to praise the gospel, easy to applaud the preacher: but to endure unto the end is peculiar to the sheep who hear the Shepherd’s voice.

- St. Augustine

Prayer for the Day:Father, help me do more than hear the Word of God proclaimed to me in the pages of the Scriptures today; help me be transformed by the living Word, Jesus Christ, and give me a spirit to endure to the end. Amen.

Journal

Day 31 - Friday



Evening Reading:But in coming to the Lord by means of ‘praying the Scripture,’ you do not read quickly; you read very slowly. You do not move from one passage to another, not until you have sensed the very heart of what you have read. You may then want to take that portion of Scripture that has touched you and turn it into prayer.

- Madame Guyon

Prayer for the Day:Lord Jesus, your Word proclaimed brings the dead to life. Let it resonate deeply in me and make me alive! Amen.

Journal

Day 32 - Saturday



Evening Reading:Do you believe that Christ was raised from the dead? Believe the same of yourself. Just as his death is yours, so also is his resurrection; if you have shared in the one, you shall share in the other.

- John Chrysostom

Prayer for the Day:Lord Jesus, the Scripture says that if we die with you we also will live with you. So help me take up my cross and die with you today, that I may walk in newness of life. Amen.

Journal

Day 33 - Sunday



Evening Reading:In the Gospels the Lord Jesus is presented as the Friend of sinners, for historically He was found, first of all, moving among the people as their Friend before He became their Savior.

- Watchman Nee

Prayer for the Day:Christ has died. Christ has risen. Christ will come again. I ponder in my heart, Lord Jesus, what it might mean for me also to be called “a friend of sinners” and ask that you would show me how to make God’s love plain to those that are far from you. Amen.

Journal

Day 34 - Monday



Evening Reading:There we shall rest and see, see and love, love and praise. This is what shall be in the end without end. For what other end do we propose to ourselves than to attain to the kingdom of which there is no end?

- St. Augustine

Prayer for the Day:Thank you, Father, for the reconciling, forgiving love you’ve shown to us in Jesus, and for the promise of the kingdom of God. Kindle in my heart today a desire for that kingdom of which there is no end. Amen.

Journal

Day 35 - Tuesday



Evening Reading:The highest form of worship is the worship of unselfish Christian service. The greatest form of praise is the sound of consecrated feet seeking out the lost and helpless.

- Billy Graham

Prayer for the Day:To love you is to love what you love, Lord Jesus. And you love those that are far from you. Help me by my life and my speech to bring those that are far off near to you. Amen.

Journal

Week 6As we enter the sixth week of our Lenten journey, drawing daily nearer to Good Friday, we can feel the pace and tension of the journey heighten. Luke recounts a decisive moment in Jesus’ ministry in chapter nine of his Gospel when he says,

“As the time approached for him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus set his face towards Jerusalem. And he sent messengers on ahead, who went into a Samaritan village to get things ready for him; but the people there did not welcome him, because he was heading for Jerusalem”(Luke 9:51-53, emphasis added).

Mark records, recollecting this same moment, “They were on their way up to Jerusalem, with Jesus leading the way, and the disciples were astonished, while those who followed were afraid” (Mark 10:32).

The Samaritans reject Him for the same reason that the disciples were astonished and those that followed him were afraid: they knew that the journey to Jerusalem represented a clash of power that would probably leave Jesus dead.

He was about to pay a steep price for living and testifying to the truth of God. In fact, Jesus makes no bones about what this means for His disciples: “Anyone who does not take up his cross and follow me is not worthy of me” (Luke 14:27).

This week we remember that discipleship is a costly enterprise indeed.

This Week’s Stream—The Sacramental Life

This week we turn our attention towards the Incarnational Stream—the Sacramental Life. Just as when we receive the bread and the cup at Communion we believe that we encounter the risen Christ, so the Incarnational Stream insists that God is accessible, manifest, and active in the warp and woof of our daily lives. The Psalmist said, “The unfailing love of Yahweh fills the earth” (Psalm 33:5). In the Sacramental Life we learn to seek out and encounter God’s presence in all of life.

Practicing the Incarnational Stream

Here are some suggestions for practicing the Incarnational Stream this week:

1. Invite God into the ordinary. So often we “silo” the Sacred, relegating it to special times, seasons, or activities. But God will not be confined to our little boxes. So seek to experience God in working, resting, playing, eating, and drinking this week. Touch, taste, and smell His presence all around you.

2. See your work as spiritual. The Bible claims that God’s original mandate to humanity was to “work and care for” the Garden (Gen 2:15). That makes work spiritual. Do your work as an act of worship and devotion to God this week, and watch Him fill it with His presence.

3. Embrace the holiness of family life and the tasks that accompany it. Life together under God’s rule is a joy if we’ll dare to believe that He is present in it. So bathe your kids, take out the trash, clean the toilet, talk with each other, and watch movies together in the name of Jesus!

Day 36 - Wednesday



Evening Reading:But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we.

- G.K. Chesterton

Prayer for the Day:Today I remember, Jesus, that discipleship is a costly thing. Help me count the cost, and after counting, give me grace to follow wherever you lead. Amen.

Journal

Day 37 - Thursday



Evening Reading:You who gives both the beginning and the completion, may You early, at the dawn of day, give to the young the resolution to will one thing. As the day wanes, may You give to the old a renewed remembrance of their first resolution, that the first may be like the last, the last like the first, in possession of a life that has willed only one thing.

- Soren Kierkegaard

Prayer for the Day:Lord Jesus, today I remember with the ancient creed that you are “God from very God.” And so it is to you that I direct my love, devotion, and obedience. Help me will you and you alone. Amen.

Journal

Day 38 - Friday



Evening Reading:We want life to have meaning, we want fulfillment, healing and even ecstasy, but the human paradox is that we find these things by starting where we are, not where we wish we were. We must look for blessings to come from unlikely places—out of Galilee, as it were—and not in spectacular events, such as the coming of a comet.

- Kathleen Norris

Prayer for the Day:Just as you set your face towards Jerusalem, Jesus, in a hard obedience to the will of the Father, help me set my face towards you in a hard obedience to your will in all the daily tasks of my life. Let an ordinary faithfulness result in an uncommonly beautiful life in submission to your call. Amen.

Journal

Day 39 - Saturday



Evening Reading:But when we are faithful in keeping ourselves in His holy presence, keeping Him always before us, this not only prevents our offending Him or doing something displeasing in His sight (at least willfully), but it also brings to us a holy freedom, and if I may say so, a familiarity with God wherein we may ask and receive the graces we are so desperately in need of. In short, by often repeating these acts they become habitual, and the presence of God becomes something that comes naturally to us.

- Brother Lawrence

Prayer for the Day:You have given a hard word, today, Lord Jesus. Following you may cost me dearly. Help me be okay with that, knowing that the reward of your kingdom far outweighs whatever I might have to give up in the present for you. Amen

Journal

Day 40 - Palm Sunday



Evening Reading:The secret of seeing, then, is the pearl of great price.

- Annie Dillard

Prayer for the Day:Christ has died. Christ has risen. Christ will come again. Jesus, there is joy today in the celebration of Palm Sunday. But there is also sadness. Because those who should have recognized you didn’t, and the welcoming crowds in Jerusalem would be the same that violently called for your crucifixion a few short days later. They looked but did not see. Give me the gift of seeing you, that when I see you, I may not reject you, but may receive you as you are—the suffering and triumphant Christ of God. Amen.

Journal

Holy WeekWe turn our attention now to the last stage of our Lenten journey—the Passion.

Without question, the mystery of the cross is deep. On the one hand, the cross represents what happens when one freely chooses the way of Truth in a world filled with lies. It is the logical end of living upright in a warped world.

On the other hand, the cross represents what happens when the claims of supremacy the established power holds are threatened, for it was Rome and Jerusalem that collaborated together to snuff out this One who claimed an authority far greater than theirs. And still more the cross represents the gravity and costliness of sin, as Isaiah said, “And the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all” (Is 53:6).

But we will never penetrate to the heart of the mystery of the cross until we use this word:

Love.

John writes, “This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us” (1 John 3:16). Or as Jesus Himself poignantly put it, “No greater love has a man than this: that he lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).

The cross will never make sense to us unless we come to grips with the love that drove God’s Son there. In the cross of Jesus Christ we meet one who bore up all of our sin and shame—who was shamed to the uttermost—in order to lift shame from us.

In the cross of Jesus Christ we meet a love and mercy that extends further and reaches deeper than our failure. In the cross of Jesus Christ we come face to face with the relentless determination of God not to leave us to our own devices, but to unmask and cripple the powers that blight our lives in order to deliver us “into the kingdom of his beloved Son” (Col 1:13).a

The cross, we must always remember, is about love. A love so penetrating and thoroughgoing that it will allow itself to be poured out, shattered, and broken for those it loves. So, Ecce homo—“Behold the man!”—this week. Look into His eyes; see His face; know His heart. His are the steely eyes that see the grim destiny that awaits Him. His is the face that is strained with the pain of knowing what is about to come. His is the heart heavy with sorrow.

Look again.

And see.

His are the eyes that see us, and you. His is the face that delighted in us enough to endure Golgotha. His is the heart that bleeds forgiveness and love. Ecce homo—Behold the man! He is Love incarnate. Love crucified. Love poured out. He is Jesus. O, come let us adore him.

Day 41 - Monday of Holy Week


Afternoon Reading:Philippians 2:5-11

Evening Reading:Mark 14:12-26

A Prayer for Holy Week:There is a place of comfort sweet,Near to the heart of God;A place where we and the Savior meet,Near to the heart of God.O Jesus, blessed Redeemer,Sent from the heart of God,Hold us who wait before youNear to the heart of God. Amen.

- Cleland McAfee

Journal

Day 42 - Tuesday of Holy Week


Afternoon Reading:Galatians 2:17-21


A Prayer for Holy Week:Love divine, all loves excelling,joy of heaven, to earth come down;fix in us your humble dwelling;all your faithful mercies crown!Jesus, thou art all compassion,pure unbounded love thou art;visit us with your salvation; enter every trembling heart. Amen.

- Charles Wesley

Journal

Day 43 - Wednesday of Holy Week


Afternoon Reading:1 Timothy 1:15-17


A Prayer for Holy Week:My faith looks up to thee, thou Lamb of Calvary, Savior divine!Now hear me while I pray,take all my guilt away,O let me from this day be wholly thine! Amen.

- Ray Palmer

Journal

Day 44 - Thursday of Holy Week

Morning Reading:Isaiah 53:1-6

Afternoon Reading:1 Corinthians 1:18-31


A Prayer for Holy Week:In blazing light your cross reveals,The truth we dimly knew:What trivial debts are owed to us,How great our debt to you!Lord cleanse the depths within our soulsAnd bid resentment cease.Then bound to all in bonds of love,Our lives will spread your peace. Amen.

- Rosamond E. Herklots

Journal

Day 45 - Good Friday

Morning Reading:Isaiah 53:7-12

Afternoon Reading:Colossians 1:15-20


A Hymn for Good FridayBehold the Man upon a cross,My sin upon His shouldersAshamed I hear my mocking voice,Call out among the scoffers.It was my sin that held Him thereUntil it was accomplishedHis dying breath has brought me lifeI know that it is finished.

- Stuart Townend

Journal

Day 46 - Holy Saturday


Afternoon Reading:Colossians 2:9-15


A Hymn for Holy SaturdayThere in the ground His body lay,Light of the world by darkness slain;Then bursting forth in glorious day,Up from the grave He rose again!And as He stands in victory,Sin’s curse has lost its grip on me;For I am His and He is mine—Bought with the precious blood of Christ.

- Keith Getty and Stuart Townend

Journal

Day 47 - Easter Sunday

Christ is Risen! He is risen indeed!


Afternoon Reading1 Corinthians 15:12-28


A Hymn for Easter SundayBe Thou my vision, O Lord of my heart;Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art.Thou my best thought, by day or by night,Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light.

Be Thou my Wisdom, Thou my true Word;I ever with Thee, Thou with me, Lord;Thou my great Father, I thy true son;Thou in me dwelling, and I with Thee one.

Riches I heed not, nor man’s empty praise,Thou mine inheritance, now and always:Thou and Thou only, first in my heart,High King of heaven, my Treasure Thou art.

High King of heaven, my victory won,May I reach heaven’s joys, O bright heav’ns Son!Heart of my own heart, whatever befall,Still be my vision, O ruler of all.

Amen.

Journal

RESOURCES

To learn more about the Streams:

Streams of Living Water: Celebrating the Great Traditions of the Christian Faith. Richard J. Foster. HarperSanFrancisco: 1998.

Many of the suggested practices for the Streams drawn from:

Ibid.

Devotional Classics: Selected Readings for Individu-als and Groups. Richard Foster and James Bryan Smith eds. HarperSanFrancisco: 2005.

A Spiritual Formation Workbook: Small Group Resources for Nurturing Christian Growth. James Bryan Smith and Lynda Graybeal. HarperSanFran-cisco: 1999.

Evening Readings Drawn (Largely) From:

Devotional Classics.

To Learn More about the Christian Calendar:

Ancient-Future Time: Forming Spirituality Through the Christian Year. Robert E. Webber. BakerBooks: Grand Rapids. 2006.

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