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Psalm 120:1-4 (121:1-4 LXX)
I lifted my eyes to the mountains; From where shall my help come?
My help comes from the Lord,
Who made heaven and earth.
Let not your foot be moved;
Neither let Him who keeps you slumber.
Behold, He who keeps Israel
Shall neither slumber nor sleep.

Encouraging Words…

God is good and according to Genesis He created us in His image. According to our early church fathers this means that we too are good. By the very nature of God, our nature is good. It is my choices, the exercising of my free will that I sin and become separated from God. Through that same free will I can choose to not sin and remain close to Him. And to ensure this He has sent His Helper to be there with me in those choices.

Proverbs 1:20-21a
Wisdom sings in the streets;
She moves boldly in the squares.
She preaches on high city walls
And sits at the gates of lords.

Encouraging Words…

The early church fathers taught that Christ was the Wisdom of God personified. Here the psalmist informs us that Wisdom, God’s Wisdom, is everywhere to be found, it is ever present. However, as we read on we are told that we must humbly hold on to righteousness in order to receive this Wisdom.

Genesis 1:5b, 8b, 13, 19, 23, 31b

…and there was evening and morning, one day.

Encouraging Words…

Today is the first full day of Lent and where do the scripture readings take us? Back to our beginnings. In Genesis, the beginning of creation…our existence. In Proverbs, the beginning of our journey into wisdom. In Isaiah, the beginning of a prophetic representation of our redeeming salvation through the coming of our King. Yesterday I was listening to a story on NPR talking about where scientists have still not figured out why we sleep. There are no real answers according to them. A lot of guesses, but no answers. And here in Genesis we see that after every phase of creation process God saw that it was good…”and there was evening and morning, one day.” We sleep because God made His creation so that it would rest. But that is not good enough for the scientists. It is not good enough to put our trust, my trust, in God and accept that He knows more and that there is this great mystery around me. One that I do not have to understand, because understanding it doesn’t make it any different, but one that exercises my faith. A faith that grows as I trust my God more and more.

Matthew 6:14-15

“For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”

Personal Challenge…

Today we celebrated “Forgiveness Sunday” at our church. In the Orthodox Church this has been done for hundreds or years. We take the opportunity to walk up to each person at the service and ask for their forgiveness of anything that we might have done to them throughout the year. And their response is, “May God forgive us all.” It is both humbling and freeing at the same time. Tomorrow we start our season of Lent (yes, our calendar is different than the western one) and this is a wonderful way to begin this season…seeking and offering forgiveness. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me!

Psalm 91:14-16 (90:14-16)

Zechariah 8:7-8

Thus says the Lord Almighty: ‘Behold, I shall deliver My people from the land of the east and from the land of the west. I shall bring them in and settle them in the midst of Jerusalem. They shall be to Me a people and I will be to them a God in truth and in righteousness.’

Encouraging Words…

Christ is typified here as the One who will bring the people of Go’s creation back into His holy presence. We have been scattered and separated from His presence and now because of the work of Christ and the love of the Father, we are being brought back into His city of Jerusalem.

Luke 23:34

Then Jesus said, Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.

Encouraging Words…

Once again I am reminded how much of an example Jesus was for me. He has been reviled, treated with contempt, and persecuted even though He had done no wrong. And yet He still asked His Father to forgive the persecutors. Am I to do any less? Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner.

Joel 2:17-18

Between the porch and the altar, the priests of the altar, ministering to the Lord, will each be weeping and will say, O Lord, spare Your people; do not give Your inheritance to reproach, that the Gentiles should rule over them, lest they should say among the Gentiles, Where is their God? But the Lord was zealous for His land and spared His people.

Encouraging Words…

Joel prophecies that Jesus, our great High Priest will stand between the alter, where sacrifices are given for our sins, and the porch, where we all stand seeking the love and forgiveness of the Lord. There He will represent us before God. Jesus will petition for us to be spared and to be brought into the kingdom of God. And through Him and His work we will be spared and receive the grace fo God poured out upon us.

1 Corinthians 8:8

But food does not commend us to God; for neither if we eat are we the better, nor if we do not eat are we the worse.

Encouraging words…

Today we observed Meatfare Sunday in the Orthodox Church. We are one week from the beginning of Great Lent and starting today we started limiting meat in our diet as we begin our preparation for the observance of the Lenten season. We do not enter into Lent because it is some legalistic rubric that we must follow in order to obtain favor with God. In our church and throughout the history of the Christian church Easter has been the high point of the calendar year. We celebrate all that Christ did for His creation and mankind every year at Easter. It is our most holy celebration and feast. “Lent is a spiritual journey and its destination is Easter, ‘the Feast of Feasts.’” (taken from Great Lent, Journey to Pascha, by Alexander Schmemann). By progressing into Lent we begin that journey of unloading our worldly desires and taking up that work of Christ. It is a period of reflection, growth and hopefulness.

1 John 2:17

And the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever.

Encouraging Words…

No matter what happens to this world, no matter what happens to me as a sojourner in this world…my God abides forever and if I strive to do His will then I will abide in Him forever. Praise be unto God.