Welcome to Lent Week One.
These meditations are an opportunity for us to stay connected to the Lenten season all week long,
Not just some days,
And think about Lent in the context of our everyday lives.
My name is Jess and I have engaged Lent in everything from giving up physical things like sugar or alcohol,
To giving up character things like sarcasm and negativity,
To really not engaging Lent at all.
But these times are meant to take the focus off of the transaction of giving something up for religious duty,
But engaging the season as a time for spiritual growth and renewal.
To start,
Let's take five big breaths together.
The science behind mindfulness practices is really quite stunning.
As we do this,
We dampen the activity in a part of our brain called the amygdala.
This increases the connection with the prefrontal cortex.
This connection helps us be less reactive to stressors and to recover better from stress as we experience it.
It sharpens focus and over time makes us more compassionate.
It has positive impact on relationships and mental health.
We are training our minds to be more attentive to life and prayer.
So feel yourself breathe for just one minute and try to be particularly mindful of how your body feels as you breathe.
That was 60 seconds.
If your mind went to other places just now or happens throughout this time,
That's okay.
It's natural and you're still here.
So let's move on.
As our first point of prayer,
Take a moment and identify where God has been today.
Rehearse the last 24 hours.
Where has God been?
In the joy and the struggle in people.
Where is God showing up?
Best of luck to you.
Uplifting music Lent begins on Ash Wednesday.
On that day,
Christians from all over the world and throughout the centuries have met together to begin the journey towards the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
In our culture,
You will often see people with ash crosses on their heads on this day.
It is an outward sign of the first acknowledgement of Lent.
From dust we come,
And to dust we will return.
It is a real-time metaphor that we are indeed only human,
That life is outside of our control.
So we trust the Creator's path for us.
If you're able,
Extend your arms out and turn your palms up,
Or rest your palms facing up on your lap.
We do this in a posture of release to the Creator.
And take a moment and reflect on how this sits with you.
From dust we come,
And to dust we will return.
We do this in a posture of release.
In Jesus's Lenten journey,
He released His cares to the Creator.
He released His friends to the Holy Spirit and ultimately His life to God's will.
In this Lenten season,
We focus on the scars on Jesus's hands.
God we place into those hands our very lives.
We live in a finite space and time and finite bodies,
So we are grateful that you know every hair on our head and hour of our time.
Our days are out of our control,
So they're yours.
It is so healthy to release the things we cannot control,
But in releasing,
What do we need to take on?
As you close your hands,
What accompanying assurances do you need from God in this season?
We exchange the desire to control with the reality of faith.
We understand our dust-ness,
So we commend the days of our lives to you,
God.
We hold loosely the cares of this world in exchange for the assurance of your presence,
Creator.
We receive the sacrifice of Christ and all that it offers as liberation to the world and our hearts.
The great spiritual writers in the Christian tradition often maintained that prayer's role is to change us in the inside as preparation for active lives lived in the world.
Our final time of silence is to spend a moment prayerfully deciding on small steps of living into Lent this year.
Maybe it is giving something up for Lent,
But making it spiritually meaningful.
Maybe it's committing to deeper prayer or some action of faith and justice.
Spend a final minute of silence before the sacrificed Christ in a posture of commitment.
HERE happens in response to the cellphone Filet M MC just We welcome you to join us for more guided prayers during the next five weeks of Lent.
We welcome you to join us for more guided prayers during the next five weeks of Lent.
