We encourage you to sign up for the 40-40-40 Lenten Challenge, a challenge with our partner Southeastern Iowa Synod to participate in Lenten practices, including these daily devotions. Just signing up counts as participation! More info here.

If you remove the yoke from among you,
  the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil,
 if you offer your food to the hungry
  and satisfy the needs of the afflicted,
 then your light shall rise in the darkness
  and your gloom be like the noonday. ~ Isaiah 58.9b-10

Ok, time to get honest. Does the church ever start to feel like a burden? Or do you sometimes feel like being part of a congregation isn’t so different from being part of another organization that has finger-pointing or bad-mouthing? Seriously – take just a moment to reflect on your own experience in congregational life. And, has that experience changed since the pandemic?

So often I hear the disappointment in the fact that, despite the fact that we are ‘church,’ the human tendencies and failures do not get checked at the door. Church is still just people: ordinary, broken, struggling humans trying to do their best in the world. Unfortunately even our best does not always go well and what was intended to be live-giving ends up being a little (or a lot) life-sucking.

Interestingly, though, God’s words to the Israelites from Isaiah do not say that they need to get their lights shining brightly in order to do good things. It is, in fact, the opposite wherein by doing good things like feeding the hungry and satisfying the needs of the afflicted, then their lights will shine. It is specifically in the doing that God’s light shines. So often our congregations invite us to be part of committees that focus on how and what we can do together as a church – in the building and for each other.

What if this Lent we reimagine exactly how and why it is that we gather together, and take a deep look at how our communal life exists so that the hungry are fed and the needy are satisfied? Imagine what church might feel like, and how bright it might shine!

Prayer

God, you call me from the ashes of death to live in the life of Christ.
Open my heart to listen to the voice of your Spirit. Give me courage to hear and boldness to act in those places you are revealing need to be changed. Broaden my imagination for what it means to be a disciple in your world, that I may more fully experience your love and grace. Amen.

Journal Prompt

Lent calls us to repentance, to turn from that which does not give life. This week I invite you to write or make a list of all that is getting in the way of you experiencing the fullness of life in Christ. What are those things in the congregation that no longer give life? Over the course of the week consider what God might be saying to you as you examine those things which hinder your experience of God’s life? What might God be calling you to let go, or leave behind, in order to create space for life?

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Week One Devotions by Rev. Erika Uthe, uthe@seiasynod.org