Lenten Meditation: "Broken"

Broken by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Scripture Reading: Psalm 31

"It’s hard to believe that Jesus is the Solid Rock when the world you’ve lived your whole life in has cracked beneath you into a thousand pieces. You can’t tell if everything is still half-broken or if it’s half-repaired, and hope is a scary concept when life has been full of false starts and crushing disappointments." ~Addie Zierman

The setting was typical and familiar--a small church on a quiet street in an urban neighborhood, family members assembled along with friends of the deceased as well as the decedent's family, and a sampling of ministers that know by heart the ins and outs of just such moments in time. Most gathered to remember a long life well lived. I joined them in order to honor a friend who was also the son of the woman that had passed. Somewhere in the mix of singing and testifying and Scripture reading came the prayer for comfort by one of the clergy present, evidently chosen for the task because he had known the woman for many years. He spoke as much to the family as he did to God, but said a curious thing in the portion of his prayer addressed to the Father: "If you drop something and break it you meant to break it, because you can surely drop it without breaking it."

We are all broken in one way or another; the key decision of life surrounds who we allow to put us back together and according to what pattern. It is good to think about our brokenness, not just in broad strokes that we are accustomed to doing on the rare occasion when something rattles us about ourselves, but in great detail like an archeologist dusting off and tagging ancient artifacts rescued from a dig. Like detecting dirt hiding in folds of skin that are prominent but no longer useful, we approach our task of remembering so that we may relinquish all our broken pieces, not in effort to become a different person but the individual we were created to be. Fermentation is a process of turmoil; chaos appears to rule in-between crushing and leavening, but the outcome when guided by a master vintner can be beautiful. This is especially difficult for me because I abhor chaos, preferring sameness, routine, predictability. I apologize frequently to my wife for being boring. She smiles, assures me I'm not, and I go on being dull--Jan Karon's Father Tim in real life. The joy of living is in acknowledging in grand detail the cracks in our pots, and allowing the Potter to recast us into what he had in mind to begin with.

Lenten Meditation: "Look for Christ"

Look for Christ by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Scripture Reading: St. Luke 9:18-27

"Lose your life and  you will save it. Submit to death, death of your ambitions and favorite wishes every day, and death to your whole body in the end: submit with every fibre of your being, and you will find eternal life. Keep back nothing. Nothing that you have not given away will be really yours. Nothing in you that has not died will be raised from the dead. Look for yourself, and you will find in the long run only hatred, loneliness, despair, rage, ruin, and decay. But look for Christ and you will find him, and with him everything else thrown in." 

~ C. S. Lewis ("Mere Christianity)

Study Guide: "A Love to Die For"

Text: Romans 5:6-8

OPEN:

Have you ever noticed how frequently we use American idioms? I didn’t, until I moved to Kenya, learned to speak Swahili, and began translating for American volunteers from English to Swahili. Here are some of the most difficult:

I have butterflies in my stomach.

It's raining cats and dogs.

Make a mountain out of a molehill.

Thought I would lose my mind.

Washed me white as snow (I was in Africa, remember?)

Expressions like these often arise when we’re searching for superlatives, words to describe the highest or utmost degree of something. It’s not big, it’s gigantic. Or, for example, we attach “super” or “mega” to a word.

The ultimate is when something is so good, it’s “to die for,” “Oh that cake is so good, it’s to die for!” When we are trying to find a way to convey the height of our love for something, what stronger language can there be than that? “You should see his house: “It’s to die for!”

When it comes right down to it, no one would actually be willing to die for chocolate cake, or a great house, but it certainly expresses vividly the height of our appreciation for those things. 

In today's text we encounter the magnitude of Christ's love for each of us. The bottom-line: The magnitude of love is demonstrated by sacrifice.

I. Christ Made the Ultimate Sacrifice (vv. 6-8).

"For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly."

  1. What is ultimately most precious to us in this life is life itself.

       1) So the giving of one’s life is the ultimate sacrifice.

     2) If it’s true that love is demonstrated through sacrifice, and that the giving up of one’s life is the ultimate sacrifice, then the giving up one’s life is also the ultimate expression of love for another human being.

That’s what it says in these verses that Jesus did:

"In deed, rarely will anyone die for a righteous person--though perhaps for a good person someone might actually dare to die. But God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us."

Not, “once our good deeds had outweighed our bad ones.”

Not, “once he saw we were basically good people.” 

While we were still sinners.

While we had not the slightest interest in Him.

While we were helpless to save ourselves

  2. The highest, noblest expression of human love is the willingness to die for someone we find worthy.

     1) Usually that worthiness is based on their relationship to us.   

     2)  The only reason most people might die for another is out of love.

II. God’s Love Exceeds the most Noble Expression of Human Love.

  1. He loved us enough to die for us, not when we were righteous or good, but JUST because He loved us.

John’s gospel tells us, that the night before He died, Jesus said, “Greater love hath no man than this, that (he) lay down his life for his friends.” 

If it’s true that the ultimate expression of love is to give up one’s life for others, then the Cross is the ultimate demonstration of God’s love.

  2. Too often we doubt or we forget God’s love. 

That’s why we have this symbol (the cross) everywhere in the church.

That’s why the cross is the most obvious symbol of the Christian faith.

That’s why we celebrate the Lord’s Supper.

That's why we make such a big deal out of Ash Wednesday, and Lent, and Good Friday in preparation for Easter.

            Not so that we always feel guilty that Jesus died for us.

            But so we will never forget how much He loves us.

One author I read said this: "To stare at the cross is to get the clearest, deepest look into the heart of God."

     1) And what do we see as we gaze into the heart of God?

Is it judgment? No, although those who reject His love will be judged.

Is it “You lousy sinner!”? No, even though all of us have sinned “and have fallen (so far) short of the glory of God.” We have all rejected Him at some time.

     2) When we “get the clearest, deepest look into the heart of God” what we see and what we hear, is “I love you.”

God is saying, “When I think of what I love the most, I think of you!

You’re “to die for.”

“I Love you enough to die” to restore the relationship willfully broken by your sin.

CLOSE:

"God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us."

The magnitude of love is demonstrated by sacrifice. The cross of Christ is proof positive that God loves you enough “to die for.”

(Dr. Dane Fowlkes)

Lenten Meditation: "Our Only Glory"

Our Only Glory by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Scripture Reading: Luke 14

"There is little we can point to in our lives as deserving anything but God’s wrath. Our best moments have been mostly grotesque parodies. Our best loves have been almost always blurred with selfishness and deceit. But there is something to which we can point. Not anything that we ever did or were, but something that was done for us by another. Not our own lives, but the life of one who died in our behalf and yet is still alive. This is our only glory and our only hope. And the sound that it makes is the sound of excitement and gladness and laughter that floats through the night air from a great banquet."

~Frederick Buechner (The Magnificent Defeat)

Lenten Meditation: "Were You There?"

Were You There? by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Scripture Reading: Matthew 27:24-61

More than wicker baskets and colorful eggs, Easter from my childhood reminds of a song. I can't tell you why, but my earliest memories of this season center around the singing of "Were You There When They Crucified My Lord?" An African American spiritual that probably predates the Civil War, "Were You There" was likely composed by slaves in the 19th Century and first published in William Barton's Old Plantation Hymns in 1899. I can still remember goosebumps popping out all over as my young heart seriously considered my own response to the lyrical question. The cross should always elicit a response. Either I turn away repulsed in unbelief, or I tremble and cling to it for dear life. Crosses are never neutral.

"The symbol of the cross in the church points to the God who was crucified not between two candles on an altar, but between two thieves in the place of the skull, where the outcasts belong, outside the gates of the city. It does not invite thought, but a change of mind. It is a symbol which therefore leads out of the church and out of religious longing into the fellowship of the oppressed and abandoned. On the other hand, it is a symbol which calls the oppressed and godless into the church and through the church into the fellowship of the crucified God."

~Jürgen Moltmann (The Crucified God)

Lenten Meditation: "Daddy's Arms"

Daddy’s Arms by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Scripture Reading: Galatians 4:1-7

We can learn a lot about God in this life if we know where to look. Hopefully we encounter him when we gather in houses of worship, but we stumble upon him most naturally and frequently during the ordinary courses of our lives. These days I'm learning volumes from our daughter's experience with foster children. Sally, has been with them a third of her tender two-plus years of life, and to her, Heath is Daddy and Mandy is Mommy. We are Papa and JoJo, just like we are to all our grandchildren. 

The family attended a Police Department party recently, and it just so happens that Sally is a party animal. A number of months before she arrived barefoot and dirty, but on this night she wore a party dress, sporting a bow in her ringlets and glittery shoes on clean feet. She wouldn't leave the dance floor. Friends cut a rug with her, but Sally mostly wanted Heath, calling him Daddy, having the time of her young life--twirling her way even deeper into all of our hearts. That is the way of our Everlasting Father: He takes us as we are, cleans us up and gives us his best, encourages us to call him Daddy even though we shouldn't, and dances with us forever. Heaven is having the time of our lives in our Daddy's arms. 

Lenten Meditation: "Grace and Grandchildren"

Grace and Grandchildren by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Scripture Reading:

Ephesians 2:1-10

I'm old enough to have grandchildren, but young enough to enjoy them. I just returned from having lunch at Crawford Elementary School with my oldest granddaughter. We have called her Katie from before her birth, but at school she goes by her first name, Sarah. We ate Subway sandwiches together in the cafeteria seated next to her friends and then walked down the hall to the library holding hands. This is all part of the book fair tradition I have with my grandchildren that live nearby. Whenever the date rolls around (and they do not allow me to forget) I take each of them in turn to the book display and let them choose a book. Each takes a different approach to the task of deciding, and I enjoy observing their budding personalities and preferences.

Grand-parenting is an educational experience unlike any other. I never thought as a kid to wield a twig like a bō staff or construct a tea party from mud and red Solo cups. I've learned that little girls are sturdy enough to romp and battle with their boy cousins but soft enough to offer butterfly kisses, and magical enough to hypnotize with dimples and blue eyes wide in wonder. I've observed little boys weep over a dead pet, then destroy legions of mutants with imaginary super powers. I wonder if the Creator looks on us with the same amused affection. Grand children are great reminders of God's grace-- we don't deserve them, but life with them is far grander than it would have been without them. 

Lenten Meditation: "Doubt and Belief"

Doubt and Belief by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Scripture Reading: Luke 14

Meditation:

Skeptics make great disciples because they refuse to take anyone else's word on anything. They insist on investigating and thinking through things for themselves. Doubt is entirely compatible with belief since Christ never called for "blind faith." Quite the opposite--he told parables of the necessity of counting the cost in following him. Know what you're getting into seemed to be his mantra. Once you do, you're ready and willing to give yourself unreservedly to him. 

"I know what torment this is, but I can only see it (doubt), in myself anyway, as the process by which faith is deepened. A faith that just accepts is a child’s faith and all right for children, but eventually you have to grow religiously as every other way, though some never do. What people don’t realize is how much religion costs. They think faith is a big electric blanket, when of course it is the cross. It is much harder to believe than not to believe. If you feel you can’t believe, you must at least do this: keep an open mind. Keep it open toward faith, keep wanting it, keep asking for it, and leave the rest to God."

~Flannery O'Connor ("The Habit of Being: Letters of Flannery O'Connor")

Lenten Meditation: "Qualifying to Celebrate"

Qualifying to Celebrate by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Scripture Reading:

Matthew 5:17-26

Meditation:

Easter is all about one thing--worship. It is the crescendo on the calendar, the ending and beginning of everything for believers. We worship a Risen Lord; the Cross and empty tomb change everything. Lent is an important part of the Easter event because it prepares our hearts to participate in the celebration. The paschal rhythm of Lent steels our heart to burst forth in jubilant praise. If Easter is worship, my heart needs help to qualify for the celebration. I fast so that I may better focus on my relationship with him.  I come to grips with who I am and all that I'm not but should be. I surrender to Christ and take my place on my own cross so that I may be his disciple.

But something else remains that is eminently practical. Jesus refers to it in the Sermon on the Mount, where he tells us that worship is impossible when we are at odds with someone else, particularly if that person is a fellow believer. We may show up consistently for church and produce an impressive religious resume. We can go through all the motions and perform all the right rituals, but our efforts are futile if we are not reconciled to our fellow believers. 

Jesus describes what it is like to live in the kingdom of God. Kingdom citizens care about others so much that they are more concerned for them than their own preferences. When people live in the kingdom of God they progressively become filled with warmth and tenderness and love for other people, such that if there is a relationship that can be reconciled they’ll run out of church to make it right--not because they are righteous, but to become more like Christ. Easter is a beautiful celebration, but there's work to be done in order to fully participate.

Study Guide: "Getting Right Instead of Getting Even"

Text: Matthew 5:21-26

 

OPEN: 

 

Easter is all about one thing--worship. We worship a Risen Lord; the Cross and empty tomb change everything. Lent is an important part of the Easter event because it prepares our hearts to participate in the celebration. The paschal rhythm of Lent steels our heart to burst forth in jubilant praise.

 

If Easter is worship, my heart needs help to qualify for the celebration. I fast so that I may better focus on my relationship with him.  I come to grips with who I am and all that I'm not but should be. I surrender to Christ and take my place on my own cross so that I may be his disciple.

 

But something else remains that is eminently practical.  Jesus refers to it here in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus tells us that worship is impossible when we are at odds with someone else, particularly if that person is a fellow believer. 

• We may show up for church. We may have quite a track record. We can go through all the motions and perform all the right rituals, but our efforts are futile if we are not reconciled to our fellow believers.

• Easter is a beautiful celebration, but there's work to be done in order to truly participate.

 

I.  ANGER IS UNAVOIDABLE BUT HATRED IS UNACCEPTABLE (21-22)

    1.  The Meaning of Anger.

• “Angry” in verse 22 is from a Greek word meaning “a smoldering cauldron of hate.”

• Sometimes anger is appropriate -- anger is not sin. It is an emotion that is God-given to motivate us to action. Hopefully - Right Action!

    2.  Hatred is a Voluntary Reaction.

Jesus vividly describes real hatred in verse 22.

• “Fool” comes from moros and is the root for the English words "moron, moronic." It means: "dull in understanding, lacking a grip on reality." It is the spirit behind the words that Jesus addresses here. Does the word spring from righteous indignation or from malignant hatred? 

    1) No one can make you hate them.

• You may be justified in your anger and hurt.  You may have every right to be offended/annoyed/ticked-off/bitter.  But you are never justified in hating another person.

1 John 2:9, “Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness.”

 

II.  Reconciliation is More Important Than Religion (23-24)

 

 1. The first step to dealing with conflict is to stop and think!  Don’t simply react. 

• Take time to reflect and ask the Spirit of God for guidance.

    1) Jesus explains the importance of conflict (vs. 23-24).

    2) This is not a new rule about church attendance! 

• How many would be here if that’s what he said? No one, including me!!!!

• Jesus is describing what it is like to live in the kingdom of God. 

• People care about others so much that they are more concerned for them than their own preferences! - That alone will deal with a LOT of conflict!

    3) When people live in the kingdom of God - they progressively become filled with warmth and tenderness and love for other people, so if there is a relationship that can be reconciled they’ll run out of church to make it right. 

• Not because they are righteous, but to become more like Christ. 

• Conflict ruins everything. It destroys friendships, marriages, families, teams, businesses, and it even destroys churches.

 2. The second step to dealing with conflict is to stop and look at yourself.

 

Matthew 7:3-5 

"And why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, Let me remove the speck from your eye; and look, a plank is in your own eye? Hypocrite! First remove the plank from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck out of your brother’s eye."

 

    1) Before you tackle conflict look at your part of the action!

    2) Jesus explains the urgency of conflict (vs. 25-26).

• Settle conflict quickly

• Is Jesus given shrewd legal advice here? No, he’s saying you have a limited amount of time so seek reconciliation while you have the chance.

• Conflict can quickly escalate into all out war! Many times it will grow until others are drawn into it and there is no way to figure it all out - except with outside help.

 3. The third step to dealing with conflict is to stop and "Look at the other person."

• Really listen to the person that you're at odds against. Let them know you heard them. 

• This is not a matter of simply repeating the words. Reflect back to them the content and the feelings of their concern. 

• When you listen to others and really hear them they are a lot more likely to listen to you!

 4. Once you have listened then you can take the 4th step: "Speak the Truth - in love."

Ephesians 4:15

"Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ."

 

Having a good outcome to conflict doesn’t have anything to do with winning. It has everything to do with loving. If we don't love each other, then all is lost and we might as well lose up shop.

 

CLOSE:

 

If you want to join in the Easter celebration, get right instead of getting even.

Worship is impossible when we are at odds with someone else, particularly if that person is a fellow believer.

Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Lenten Meditation: "Getting Along"

Getting Along by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Scripture Reading:

1 Corinthians 1; 13

Meditation:

I'm beginning to think it's harder to live like Jesus at church than anywhere else. Christians appear to work less at getting along than those who claim no connection to the church or Jesus; I'll never cease to be amazed at the way we treat one another in the name of Christ. Is it any wonder that the masses are either turning away or staying away from Church? Who can blame anyone for choosing not to be the brunt of someone else's critical spirit, even if that less than exemplary spirit is displayed "in Jesus' name." I learned just last week of one man who loves the Lord but left church because the stress he experienced being among other church members was too much to bear.

There is more good natured camaraderie and joie de vivre at the corner pub than in many churches. I can't help but wish that church more resembled Alcoholics Anonymous than the Friday Night Fights. I have believed for years that what most of us are seeking is an accepting group of individuals that love without judgment or condemnation. I hang on to the slim hope that this may one day be found at church. 

Lenten Meditation: "Narrative of Grace"

Narrative of Grace by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Scripture Reading: St. John 3:1-21

Meditation:

The Gospel is Good News because it is a narrative of grace custom fit for each individual. None of us are cast in another's mold; Jesus comes and interacts with my story. If he finds me cooperative and compliant, over time I start to look like him. Christianity is never forceful, but it is not passive. Christ refuses to push the issue against my will; he bends instead of breaks.

"Christ was crucified because he would have nothing to do with the crowd (even though he addressed himself to all). He did not want to form a party, an interest group, or a mass movement, but wanted to be what he was, the truth, which is related to the single individual."       

 ~Søren Kierkegaard, Provocations

Lenten Meditation: "Tasting Death"

Tasting Death by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

---

Scripture Reading:

Galatians 2

Meditation:

(The following is an excerpt from my soon-to-be published book, Ordinary Glory: Finding Grace in the Commonplace)

Thirty six years ago, my best friend and I embarked on an epic journey. Fresh out of high school and sporting my own set of wheels, I somehow convinced my friend’s naïve parents to trust him into my care for a road trip from Port Arthur to Mississippi and back. My ace in the hole was that our destination was a church camp and that the purpose of this extended soirée was spiritual growth. They consented and we departed. Oh, the feeling of youthful independence, conquering asphalt in a rust red tank officially identified as a ’65 Ford Galaxy, heating pork and beans for dinner at roadside parks, and singing off key at the top of our lungs to music blasting from state-of-the-art 8-track.

Dark-thirty in some obscure-to-me portion of Mississippi with radio blaring to stay awake behind the wheel, we navigated a blind curve without noticing an unlighted Rail Road crossing warning. Neither of us saw the sign in the dark because we were too busy talking to pay attention, so we emerged from the bend just as a train approached the intersection from the west. The train’s horn roared, I stomped the accelerator, and somehow we crossed the tracks just ahead of the train, feeling its draft as we plunged past. Stunned into silence, I pulled the car to a stop on the side of the road to allow time to collect what remained of our nerves and talk about what just almost happened. As we debriefed, we were convinced that God had rescued us from ourselves and decided that it was as good a time as any to prepare to die. We hastily scribbled a note to the effect that if anyone found us dead, they were to rest assured that we knew the Lord and that we wished the same for them. To cap it all off, we laid awake long enough that night to commit to memory what has become my life verse–Galatians 2:20. For the first time in my life, I had a glimpse of the truth that no one is ready to live unless they’ve tasted death in themselves. 

“I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.” 

(Galatians 2:20, KJV)

Lenten Meditation: "Cleaning Carports"

Cleaning Carports by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Scripture Reading:

Hebrews 10

Meditation:

My wife and I returned from our spring break vacation resolute to change our diet and conditioning. A mainstay of the plan is to alternate strong walking with strength training.  Our first day back included a brisk three mile walk on the dam, so the next was time to break out the Bowflex and deadweights. That's when the plan hit a snag. I've needed to clean the carport all winter because leaves tend to accumulate there as if hibernating or laying low and hiding from who knows what--leaves on top of leaves, with a great many of them blanketing our exercise equipment. Before we could flex and lift, I had to bend and rake. I worked on clearing the Bowflex so my wife could begin, and continued sweeping and raking and shoveling to see the floor again. Who knew you could do yard work under a carport? Long after my wife completed her workout I continued my battle with winter clutter. An hour or so later I called it quits; it was too late and I was too spent to lift anything else, so I retreated to my easy chair and a cup of coffee with blueberry fig newtons for comfort.

Leaves aren't the only things I allow to accumulate. Unsightly emotions have done some hibernating of their own forming clutter that stifles effort toward spiritual strength training and diminishes intensity and focus on what matters most. Discipleship contradicts clutter and demands stringent attention to whatever threatens the heart. Only when the garbage is removed am I able to see what needs to be done.

Lenten Meditation: "Buechner on Grace"

Buechner on Grace by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Scripture Reading: Ephesians 2

Meditation:

Frederick Buechner is unique in the way he expresses himself. I read Buechner and say to myself, "Why didn't I think of that?" Here are his thoughts on grace, originally published in Wishful Thinking and reprinted in Beyond Words:

After centuries of handling and mishandling, most religious words have become so shopworn nobody's much interested any more. Not so with grace, for some reason. Mysteriously, even derivatives like gracious and graceful still have some of the bloom left.

Grace is something you can never get but only be given. There's no way to earn it or deserve it or bring it about any more than you can deserve the taste of raspberries and cream or earn good looks or bring about your own birth.

A good sleep is grace and so are good dreams. Most tears are grace. The smell of rain is grace. Somebody loving you is grace. Loving somebody is grace. Have you ever tried to love somebody?

A crucial eccentricity of the Christian faith is the assertion that people are saved by grace. There's nothing you have to do. There's nothing you have to do. There's nothing you have to do.

The grace of God means something like: Here is your life. You might never have been, but you are because the party wouldn't have been complete without you. Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid. I am with you. Nothing can ever separate us. It's for you I created the universe. I love you.

There's only one catch. Like any other gift, the gift of grace can be yours only if you'll reach out and take it.

Maybe being able to reach out and take it is a gift too.

Lenten Meditation: "Forgiveness"

Forgiveness by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Scripture Reading: Isaiah 43

Meditation:

"Forgiveness is the answer to the child’s dream of a miracle by which what is broken is made whole again, and what is soiled is made clean again. The dream explains why we need to be forgiven, and why we must forgive. In the presence of God, nothing stands between him and us – we are forgiven. But we cannot feel his presence if anything is allowed to stand between ourselves and others."

~Dag Hammarskjöld (Markings)

Lenten Meditation: "Words"

"Words" by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Scripture Reading:

Psalm 51

Meditation:

"It speaks in a way they cannot avoid hearing for themselves, which is the awesome power of words because, although there are times when they shield us from reality, at other times they assail us with it." 

~ Frederick Buechner

Language speaks. At first glance, no statement could be more ridiculously obvious. Everybody knows that words are our means of communicating with one another; however, on second thought they contain more potential than that. Words build and destroy empires; language launches movements and topples them. Words determine destinies. The most powerful ones are what we say to ourselves if they are honest words. Transparent confession results in transformation if the word we speak afterward is forgiveness; in fact, this is the most powerful word in any language--forgiven. One may argue that love has more weight, but love that carries a grudge evaporates leaving no lasting impression. Forgiveness restores.

Lenten Meditation: "Convenient Memory"

Convenient Memory by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Scripture Reading:

Philippians 3

Meditation:

The Apostle Paul did not have in mind spiritual amnesia, nor was he advocating self-deception. His declaration is more akin to moving on than to pretending the past was something that it clearly wasn't. We've probably all taken a stab at those mental maneuvers. At times I hide behind what may be termed convenient memory, hints of reality that I manipulate in order to ignore the more pressing truth of what I was or failed to be. In these mind games, the memory justifies the end.  What good is there in manufactured reminiscence? I am convinced that I never benefit from my past apart from brutal honesty. Wishing that things had been different does not make them so and actually distances me from any real growth and progress beyond the hurt or error or misguided choice. Truth is the only clear way to the Father and it is the only trustworthy way to myself. 

Lenten Meditation: "Hunger for Most"

Hunger for Most by Dr. Dane Fowlkes

Scripture Reading: 

Matthew 6:16-21

Meditation:

“Some have exalted religious fasting beyond all Scripture and reason; and others have utterly disregarded it.”

~John Wesley

Lent and fasting quite naturally go together naturally. Lent harkens back to Jesus Christ's wilderness experience in preparation for his public ministry, in which Jesus intensified his focus on prayer by fasting from food for 40 days. It also may be associated with Moses' 40 days on Mount Sinai with God, and the 40 year journey of the Israelites wandering in the desert. Lent for contemporary believers is a period of somber self-examination designed to promote intense hunger for God, and nothing reveals what eats at me as clearly as when my appetites are exposed in light of a renewed hunger for God.

“In a culture where the landscape is dotted with shrines to the Golden Arches and an assortment of Pizza Temples, fasting seems out of place, out of step with the times.  In fact, fasting has been in general disrepute both in and outside the Church for many years" (Richard Foster). Fasting is never intended to be punitive. True Christian fasting doesn’t seek suffering or self-denial as an end, but as a way to love something less so that God might be loved more. Actually, fasting does not always deal with abstinence from food; it is the denial of any normal function of life in order to become more absorbed in seeking God. Herein lies the rub: What masters us has become our god; and Paul warns us about those “whose god is their appetite” (Phil 3:18). What we hunger for most, we worship.

Lenten Meditation: "Chambers on Surrender"

Chambers on Surrender by Dr. Dane Fowlkes Scripture Reading:  Philippians 1; Romans 1:16-17 Meditation: Consider these thoughts on surrender from Oswald Chambers in My Utmost for His Highest: We will all feel very much ashamed if we do not yield to Jesus the areas of our lives He has asked us to yield to Him. It’s as if Paul were saying, “My determined purpose is to be my utmost for His highest—my best for His glory.” To reach that level of determination is a matter of the will, not of debate or of reasoning. It is absolute and irrevocable surrender of the will at that point. An undue amount of thought and consideration for ourselves is what keeps us from making that decision, although we cover it up with the pretense that it is others we are considering. When we think seriously about what it will cost others if we obey the call of Jesus, we tell God He doesn’t know what our obedience will mean. Keep to the point—He does know. Shut out every other thought and keep yourself before God in this one thing only—my utmost for His highest. I am determined to be absolutely and entirely for Him and Him alone. Paul was determined that nothing would stop him from doing exactly what God wanted. But before we choose to follow God’s will, a crisis must develop in our lives. This happens because we tend to be unresponsive to God’s gentler nudges. He brings us to the place where He asks us to be our utmost for Him and we begin to debate. He then providentially produces a crisis where we have to decide—for or against. That moment becomes a great crossroads in our lives. If a crisis has come to you on any front, surrender your will to Jesus absolutely and irrevocably.