But Lent, the 40 days preceding Easter, reminds us that sometimes life does have genuine limits. What are the origins of the restrictions in your life? Failing health? Problems associated with getting older? More responsibilities at home or at work? Problems with teen-agers? Being forced to make decisions for others rather than yourself? A lack of money? Immaturity? Spiritual malaise?
This time of year can also be a time of disjunction in our churches as well. Officers can become discouraged, they worry about dwindling winter attendance; they wonder if they can meet the annual budget; anxiety about a faltering youth program and administrative or personnel problems create additional anxiety.
Lent is a good time to take stock of our emotional and spiritual lives and find ways to bolster our spirits. Asking questions and talking to trusted advisors helps.
• Why am I discouraged about my congregation right now? Is it because of normal circumstances or or are my feelings caused by things the officers have caused by their own mistaken decisions?
• Are the problems as bad as they seem or are they really opportunities God has placed before us, forcing us to make choices in faith?
• Are the situations out of control, things with which we must learn to cope, or can they be changed through prayer and diligence?
• Where can the session members, deacons, trustees and pastors get help, if they are not afraid to ask?
Lent (and Easter) reminds us that problems can be solved. Life’s limits will be overcome. The power of God is great. Our churches can be revived and given hope, even if we have to accept changes, if we face reality honestly, and ask God for help.
What is more, during Lent we have a good opportunity to strengthen our personal and congregational spiritual lives in advance for unknown challenges and opportunities that we cannot even anticipate. Why not begin with a time of prayer and Scripture reading during which all the members join together to ask for strength and place the church’s future confidently back in God’s hands?
One simple starting point might be to ask all members to join together in the reading of the book of Psalms, two or three per day, until they have all been read, praying for the the church every day as they proceed. The Psalms are brutally honest, they analyze difficulties squarely, and they conclude repeatedly that God can give us power as we share our joys and sorrows and acknowledge our opportunities and limitations. As one Psalmist puts it, as if he already foresees the yellow iris breaking through his garden’s spiritual icebanks,
Why are you cast down, O my soul,
and why are you disquieted within me?
Hope in God; for I shall again give praise,
to my help and my God (Psalm 43:5).
Posted March 19, 2003
Earl S. Johnson Jr. is the pastor of First church, Johnstown, N.Y. His latest book is Witness Without Parallel: Eight Biblical Texts That Make Us Presbyterian (Geneva, 2003).
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